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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, 

BUREAU OP EDUCATION. 



?Umim TKEES IN SCHOOL GROUNDS 



AND THB 



CELEBRATION OP ARBOR DAY. 



WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 

J 1885. 




DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, 

BTJEEAU OF EDUCATION. 



PLANTING TREES IN SCHOOL GROUNDS 



A2a> THB 



CELEBRATION OF ARBOR DAY 



WASHINGTON: 

aOVERNMENT FEINTING OFFICE. 
1885. 



^: 



e?^ 



CONTENTS 



Page. 

Note V 

PLANTING TREES IN SCHOOL GROUNDS. 

General considerations 3 

Where to plant 5 

What should we plant ? 6 

When to plant 7 

Arbor day 7 

Collections 8 

TREES AND TREE PLANTING AND THE CELEBRATION OF ARBOR DAY. 

Officers of the Ohio State Forestry Association for 1884 2 

Preface 3 

Introduction 11 

PAKT FIEST. 

Lessons from history and other facts 15 

Palestine 15 

Germany - 15 

Province of Diiben, Saxony 16 

France 16 

Spain 16 

The eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea 17 

Sicily 17 

Pyrenees 17 

Italy 18 

Island of Ascension 18 

Ceylon 18 

St. Helena 19 

Island of Santa Cruz 19 

Algiers, Saint Jago Island 20 

Island of Ternate 20 

Bucharia «. 20 

Ohio 21 

Kentucky 21 

Massachusetts 21 

The Northwest l. 22 

Arizona 22 

Nevada , 23 

Forests and their management in other countries 24 

How moisture is retained by forests 26 

Effects of the cutting of forests on water supply of rivers 27 

The rain and forests 28 

Floods ^, 29 

Immense amount of water given to the atmosphere by trees 29 

ni 



IV CONTENTS. 

Page. 

Healthfulness of forests 29 

Mechanism of a tree 30 

Proportionate area of woodland 31 

Roadside trees 31 

Famous trees 32 

Arbor Day 34 

Destruction of forests in Ohio 35 

How to plant trees 36 

Some thoughts and suggestions on tree-planting 36 

Transplanting trees 37 

Planting forests 39 

Forest culture 39 

Profits of forest culture 40 

Village improvement societies 43 

PART SECOND. 

Selections on trees for arbor day celebrations 45 

The Wayside Inn — An Apple Tree 47 

Forest Song 48 

Song to the Trees 49 

The Oak 50 

The Forest Flowers 53 

The Forest 56 

The Oak 57 

The Poplar Field 61 

The Woodland Hallo 62 

The Pine Tree 63 

The Pine Tree 64 



NOTE 



Department of the Interior, 

Bureau of Education, 

Washington, January 31, 1885. 
In response to numerous demands made on this Office for information 
respecting tree planting and the celebration of arbor day, the follow- 
ing pamphlets are printed for general distribution. The first, by Dr. 
Hough, which originally appeared, in 1883, as a bulletin of the Bureau 
of Education, has proved very helpful to the numerous educators who 
have already received it. The second work, first published under the 
auspices of the Ohio State Forestry Association in 1884, is presented 
through the courtesy of Hon. John B. Peaslee, superintendent of the 
public schools of Cincinnati, by whom it was copyrighted and who 
kindly loans the plates. 

JOHN EATON, 
Commissioner. 



PLANTING TREES IN SCHOOL GROUNDS. 



de. feanklin b. hough. 



DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, 

BUREAU OP EDUOATIOK 



PLANTING TREES IN SCHOOL GROUNDS. 



DEPABTMBNT of the INTEEIOE, BtJBEAU OF EDUCATION, 

Washington, April 9, 1883. 

The advisability of adorning school grounds by planting shade and ornamental trees 
in the vicinity of the school-house has frequently been dvrelt upon by educational 
writers and architects and has been more than once referred to in the publications of 
this Office. Abroad the subject has generally received a greater share of the attention 
its importance demands than in this country, and in Austria the taste and knowledge of 
pupils are developed by means of their own contributions in beautifying the school 
grounds through the planting and care of trees and shrubs. In several States of the 
American Union, however, there is a growing disposition among school officers to avail 
themselves of this effective means of culture and to foster a spirit in the commimity 
which win facilitate the operation of laws passed for the encouragement of tree planting 
and the protection of trees; in Connecticut, especially, the late energetic secretary of the 
State board of education, Hon. B. G. Northrop, inaugurated a movement which is im- 
proving the surroundings of schools in the rural districts almost beyond recognition, and 
in West Virginia the commendable efforts of the department of public instruction, itnder 
the direction of Hon. B. L. Butcher, have resulted in similar improvements. The work 
of Dr. Peaslee, city superintendent of Cincinnati, in the same direction, has also been 
especially successftil. 

Many considerations of an obviously persuasive character may readily be adduced to 
encourage the practice of tree planting, whether the subject be looked at from an economi- 
cal, a sanitary, or an aesthetic standpoint, and in the excited interest with reference to 
this subject which characterized the centennial year they were vigorously urged and 
favorably received. Trees, moreover, are largely planted with a view to benefit pos- 
terity, and advantages may accrue that were not at all foreseen by the original planter. 
A striking illustration of this is afforded in the case of Evelyn's Sylva, published in 
1664. Evelyn's efforts were mainly directed to introducing ornamental plantations into 
England, but they eventually resulted in supplying her at an opportune moment with 
the timber needed in the construction of the navy by means of which she maintained 
here supremacy at sea during the Napoleonic wars. 

The writer of the accompanying letter, Dr. Franklin B. Hough, chief of the forestry 
division in the Department of Agriculture, is a gentleman whose unusual attainments 
and wide experience in the science of arboriculture peculiarly entitle him to be heard. 

JOHN EATON, 

Commissioner. 



WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT PEINTINa OFFIOB. 
1885. 



PLANTING TREES IN SCHOOL GROUNDS. 



Washington, March 27, 1883. 
SiK : Having been often asked for advice on the matter of tree planting upon grounds 
adjacent to school-houses and other educational institutions, I deem it proper to submit 
to you some suggestions on the subject which, if thought suitable, might be recommended 
by you to those having charge of the property of these establishments. Besides answer- 
ing the inquiries now pending, and thus relieving me from the care of separate reply, 
the suggestions, supported by your recommendation, might lead to planting upon these 
grounds in many places where the intention had not previously been entertained, and 
the benefits as well in the direct effect secured from actual plantation as indirectly in the 
cultivation of a taste for rural ornament and homestead improvement might be assured. 

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 

There are some points to be considered at the outset which apply to all situations and 
to every case that may arise. Trees planted adjacent to school-houses, academies, and 
the like will be exceptionally liable to injury from the thoughtless or possibly the ma- 
licious acts of children, to prevent which they must be carefully taught the necessity of 
letting them alone; and incidentally they should be told how imjwrtant it is, not only 
with the trees that may be set upon their school-house grounds, but upon plantations 
generally, whether for ornament or profit, that they should be guarded from injuries of 
every kind. 

There is perhaps no injury to which trees in front of a school-house are more exposed 
than that of being wounded or broken down through use as hitching posts for horses. 
To prevent this, there should be provided a sufficient number of strong posts for this use; 
and as a further protection there should be a bar outside of the outer line of trees and a 
separate guard around every tree, at least until the trees have grown to a size that will 
render this protection no longer needed. 

In starting groves of trees, it is sometimes cheaper to sow or plant the seeds where the 
trees are to remain; but in no case will this be possible in the plantations we are con- 
sidering. The trees used must be first started, and should be grown to as great a size as 
practicable before they are set.- To secure success they should be selected from nursery 
plantations or from those that have sprung up in open places, such as the seedling trees 
along fences, so that there may be an abundance of the svuill fibrous roots. Without this 
precaution they will be very liable to fail. It should be further borne in mind, that if 
the roots are much exposed to the sun or to a cold or drying wind their vitality may be 
soon lost. Great care should be taken, if they are brought from an adjoining place and 
planted immediately, to retain as much soil among them as possible, and to prefer a damp 
and cloudy day. By placing the roots of the trees as soon as they are drawn from the 
ground upon a coarse strong sheet of canvas, and binding this around them, this object 
may be best secured. Straw or moss, a little dampened, will serve this purpose very 
well, and sometimes the trees may be set in a box or barrel with some of the better soil 
in which they grew, for their removal. Sometimes trees can be removed in winter with 
great advantage by digging a trench around them in the fall and allowing the earth to 
reeze, so that a disk, including the tree and its roots, may be removed entfre. 

3 



It should, however, be remembered that the transplanting of large trees is a difficult, 
uncertain, and expensive process, and that as a general rule, for the plantations under 
notice, the largest size should not exceed tveo inches in diameter. Trees of half this 
thickness VFOuld be much less likely to fail, and would in five years probably outgrow 
the larger ones, but they would need a little more protection at first and might not be 
as much respected as their ' ' big brothers. " If of the larger size, they might need brac- 
ing with wires to prevent them from being swayed by the winds until their roots are 
well started. The greatest care should be taken to prevent the wires from cutting into 
the trees, by placing blocks of wood around the places where the wires are fastened, and 
by providing that the growth at that place is not too much obstructed while they remain. 
In taking up a tree we should avoid cutting off the large roots too near the trunk. They 
should be carefully followed out to a convenient distance, and in setting them again, 
they should have space enough provided without bending them. Besides the gain in 
nutrition thus secured by the tree, we have by this means an additional security in the 
bracing and support secured by a broad base and steady ' ' anchorage. ' ' The ends of 
broken roots should be cut off" smooth before the tree is planted. 

The holes for the trees should be always made before the trees are brought on the 
ground. They should be somewhat larger and deeper than those needed in common 
planting on private lands, because it is desirable to give the trees the best possible oppor- 
tunity at the start. The surface soil, being generally the best, should be throvra up on 
one side, and the poor er soil firom below on the other. In filling in, the better soil 
should be returned first, so as to be nearer the roots. In hard clayey soils great advan- 
tage is gained by digging the holes in the fall, so that the earth may be exposed to the 
weather through the winter. The holes might be loosely covered vrith boards when 
necessary. If the soil be somewhat sterile, a wagon-load of rich loam, compost, or wood's 
earth, placed below and around the roots, would be the cheapest means for insuring 
success. In applying manures care should be taken that they be placed below and near, 
but not in contact with the roots. In setting the tree it should be placed a trifle deeper 
than it stood before, the roots should be spread out so that none are doubled, and fine 
rich soil should be carefully sifted in among them so as to fill every space. Sometimes 
the roots are dipped in a tub containing a thin mud of rich soil before they are set. 
In any event, unless the soil is evidently damp enough, the trees should be well watered 
as soon as they are planted, and this process in dry seasons should be repeated from time 
to time tlirough the first and second years. If it be a very dry soil, this watering should 
be continued longer, and this is a service that can be assigned to the scholars with great 
propriety, but should not be overdone. The soil should be pressed down around the 
roots to give them a firm hold. In the light porous soil of the prairies it can scarcely be 
too firmly trodden down, as well at the bottom of the holes before setting, as on the top 
after the tree is planted. The surface should not be rounded up around the trees, at 
least no more than to allow for settling, and the tree, when well established, should have 
the soil around it on the level or, if anything, a little below the general surface. In 
shovelling paths in the snow, it is well to heap it up around the trees in winter, to pre- 
vent them from starting prematurely in spring. 

The fresh surface around a newly planted tree, if in a dry climate, should be mulched 
by a covering of straw, leaves, or of wood chips, the last being always a proper surface- 
dressing around young trees. If the .soil is not otherwise covered as above, it should be 
kept free from weeds and grass until the trees are well started, and it should be pre- 
vented from baking by occasionally raking or hoeing the surface lightly, especially in a 
dry time. If the grounds are naturally wet, they should be properly drained. In excep- 
tional cases, where irrigation is possible and the soil and climate are of the arid type, 
this may be the only means for making trees survive. 

In taking up a tree for transplanting, a part of the roots will necessarily be left in the 
ground. It is in many cases necessary to shorten the branches, so that a due balance 



may be maintained between the foliage and the roots, for as a rule the trees with most 
vigorous tops are best supplied with roots. It will be necessary to trim off the side 
branches of trees planted for ornament aroimd school-houses, until the tops are carried 
above reach. It is often proper with larger trees to afford some shelter to the trunks thus 
exposed to the sun, by binding straw around them or by placing a board as a screen on 
the south side. 

WHEEE TO PLANT. 

It is needless to remark that a school room needs an abundance of fresh air and suffi- 
cient light. The trees planted upon the grounds around it should therefore stand far 
enough away to allow a free circulation of the air, although they might when grown 
afford a grateful shade. As a general rule, even in the smallest grounds, a row of trees 
may be planted in the street, six or eight feet from the fence line, but always protected 
by guards and hitching posts, as already noticed. In small lots the comers only might 
admit of further planting; but with wider opportunity we may gain some effect from 
the grouping of trees, and upon still more ample premises, such as should always belong 
to academies and colleges, we may with great profit attempt the cultivation of trees in 
considerable variety with the view of securing a pleasing combination of views and ob- 
ject lessons in sylviculture. If there be outbuildings, they should be invariably screened 
by trees, and if there be an adjoining marshy spot, it should be covered with trees or 
bushes suited to the conditions. 

It may sometimes happen that the owners of the adjoining lands may be willing to 
plant the roadsides leading to the school-house with an avenue of trees, or they may con- 
sent to this being done by those interested in the school grounds under improvement. 
It is always very desirable to enlist the children of the school in these operatioos, by 
their assistance in the planting and their care afterward. Where certain trees are as- 
signed to particular scholars or to little committees to whom their protection is in- 
trusted, the interest thus secured would not fail to produc the happiest effect. The 
trees might be named in memory of some person or some event worthy of remembrance, 
and the associations thus created would not fail to recall the pleasant associations that 
happy childhood is sure to impart to after life. 

As to the intervals between the trees planted in lines, something will depend upon 
their kinds and upon the soil, exposure, and other circumstances of the place. As a 
general rule, in grove and forest planting, a great many more trees must be started than 
we expect or wish to have grow to full size, and they must be thinned out from time to 
time as they become crowded. "We thus secure high and uniform bodies to the trees, without 
the need of side pruning. But in the case of trees in avenues, we cannot do this, excepting 
by sometimes taking out alternate trees. It is sometimes the custom to plant for more 
immediate effect the alternate trees of some rapidly growing kind, which tend to make 
the others grow higher, as, for example, poplars and elms, the former being taken out 
when they are no longer wanted. From fifteen to twenty feet will generally be found a 
proper interval ; but in the case of those with vsdde spreading tops thirty feet should be 
allowed. 

Before leaving the subject of methods in planting we should not fail to condemn a 
practice that has been followed in certain irrigated districts in the far West, in which 
jwles of Cottonwood, without root or branch and sometimes large enough for telegraph 
poles, have been set along streets and have grown to become trees. In fact, poles 
set for telegraph use have thus budded and grown like Aaron's rod where trees were 
not expected or desired. Such trees, however, become hollow in a few years, and are 
short lived. The reason is obvious ; for the branches are put forth at some distance 
below the top, which dries up and rots off, leaving a hole open to the rains. The lower 
end gives off roots around the edge and sides, but the middle part soon rots from the 
absorption of water imtil a hollow space is formed from one end to the other. A small 
tree would outgrow such a pole in a few years and survive half a century after it was 
dead and forgotten. 



WHAT SHOULD WK PLANT? 

In a cotmtry extending over such a length and breadth as the United States, no gen- 
eral answer could possibly be given to this question, further than this: as a rule we 
should select, especially for small grounds, the species that grow naturally in the region 
about and which were found to be most hardy and certain when transplanted. The 
deciduous species would almost always have preference, except upon grounds of ample 
size, in which groups and masses of evergreen trees might appear to fine advantage 
among those that shed their leaves in autumn. There is one situation, however, in 
which a screen of evergreens would be very generally proper, viz, for the concealment 
of outhouses and other unsightly premises. For this use the arbor vitas, Norway spruce, 
or red cedar in the North, or the vines with evergreen leaves in the South, wotild be most 
appropriate. It might sometimes be worth its cost for a neighbor to plant such a screen 
upon his own side of the fence, along the line of the school-house lot, and this could 
scarcely fail of proving a welcome addition to plantations upon the public premises ad- 
jacent. 

In selecting the kinds of trees that should be planted regard should be had to their 
liability to injury from accident, their tendency to sprout where not wanted, the agree- 
able or disagreeable odors tha^ they may emit, the ornamental character of their flowers 
or fruit, their longevity, rate of growth, and other circumstances tending to make them 
more or less acceptable in the places where they are to remain. It is scarcely worth 
while to consider the value of their wood, as trees in such places would scarcely ever be 
cut until they were passing to decay. 

Taking up the points of excellence or of disadvantage in the order above mentioned, we 
will state some considerations that deserve notice under each: 

1. Liability to injury from accident. — The part most liable to injury is the bark, and 
wherever any part of this covering is bruised or broken off the wood underneath dies. 
The wound is only healed by growing over on the sides, and years may be required to 
repair an injury that can never be entirely made good in the wood within. "While most 
trees are more liable to injury while they are small and all of them axe more easily 
peeled in early summer while the new layer of wood is forming, there are some that 
acquire greater immunity with age than others. Of all the native trees of the Northern 
States the American elm ( Ulrnus Americana) is perhaps least liable to accident from a 
bruise upon the bark; and there are few if any that should be more generally preferred. 
It carries its shade high above the level of our windows; it is seldom broken or thrown 
down by the winds; it lives to a great age and grows to a large size, and it presents a 
majestic and graceful outline as agreeable to the view as its spreading canopy is refreshing 
in its shade. The red or slippery elm might be liable to be peeled by unruly boys, for 
its inner bark, and should for this reason be planted only upon private grounds. 

The maples are justly prized as shade trees, and the sugar maple {Acer saccJiarinum) 
may perhaps be placed first on the list, as affording a dense shade and a gracetul oval 
outline; but as we go west its growth becomes slower, until it ceases to be desirable as 
an ornamental tree. Of the soft maples {Acer rvbrum and A. dasycarpum), the former is 
noted for its bright red blossoms and the latter for the lighter color on the underside of the 
leaves and for its very rapid growth, but it is easily broken by the winds and in some 
localities is liable to injury from borers. Both of the soft maples ripen their seeds early 
in the season, and should be sown the same year. All of the maples are conspicuous 
in the decl i ning year from the bright coloring of their autumnal foliage. The box elder 
or ash -leaved maple {Negundo aeeroides), a nearly allied species, is a favorite shade-tree 
in the Western States, and grows well in the middle latitudes of the Atlantic States, 
but does not endure a cold climate. 

The poplars and the cotton woods (all belonging to the genus Populus and forming many 
species) grow rapidly, and some of them where other trees can scarcely be made to thrive. 
The tall columnar Lombardy poplar can scarcely be recommended, excepting in the 



background, to relieve the monotony of other trees. It grows very rapidly, but is short- 
lived. The beech, birches, catalpa (of the hardy species), oaks, linden, hickories, wal- 
nuts, locust, sycamore (or American plane tree), chestnut, ash (of several species), 
mountain ash, buckeyes, tulip-poplar, and many other trees afford advantages more or 
less worthy of notice throughout the Northern States, whUe in the Southern and Pacific 
States there is a wide range of choice among a great number of native species. 

In wet places, the willows, alders, American larch, black ash, and some of the oaks find 
an appropriate place, and we should not fail to especially commend the gray willow as 
particularly valuable as a wind-break in the Northwest, where a screen of this kind 
around the border of a school-house lot would prove a luxury in winter as well as a joy 
in summer, even if there were no other plantation upon the premises. It does not re- 
quire a wet soil, like some of the species; it grows well from cuttings, without roots, that 
are simply stuck into a soil well prepared, and it grows rapidly in regions where many 
other trees cannot be made to live. 

2. Tendniq/ to sprout. — The poplars, wUlows, locust, ailantus, and some other kinds of 
trees have the habit of sending up sprouts from their tracing roots at some distance from 
the trunk. In tracts reserved for timber growth there is no objection to this; in fact, 
it becomes a valuable means for their reproduction; but in ornamental plantations it be- 
comes a nuisance that should sometimes be avoided. The first two of these are particu- 
larly liable to fill water pipes and wells with their roots, and they will sometimes insin- 
uate themselves into the crevices of walls, and tend to weaken the foundations of build- 
ings, or to start a leak in aqueducts, by the expansion of their roots. 

3. TTie odors emitted by trees. — The ailantus is known to have a sickening odor when in 
blossom. Many trees are perceptibly fragrant when in blossom. The pines emit a res- 
inous and the eucalyptus a balsamic odor, which is reputed to be healthy and to most 
persons is agreeable. 

As to the other qualities of ornament, in flowers and fruit and the like, there is an 
unlimited range of choice, and there are few sections of the cotmtry within the inhab- 
ited regions that do not present opportunities for cultivation well deserving of notice. 

WHEN TO PLINT: 

As a general rule, trees succeed best when planted in spring. It is a common remark 
that the " season for planting corn" is a proper time for planting generally, and it ia 
not far from the truth. In some sections, however, fall planting has preference, and in 
large operations about a month in spring and another month in fall are given to the 
business. In the case of deciduous trees it may be broadly stated that they may be 
transplanted with more or less certainty at any period between the fall of the leaves in 
autumn and the appearance of leaves in spring. With the coniferous evergreens the 
most vigorous time of growth — just after the buds have started — is preferred. In cases 
where the young trees are set from pots or boxes without disturbing the soil about the 
roots, they can be set in the earth at any time when the ground is not frozen, but do 
best when planted in spring. 

AEBOE DAY. 

In several of the "Western States they have what is properly named an "arbor day," 
sometimes appointed by law and at other times designated by other authority or fixed 
upon by agreement, to be wholly devoted to the planting of trees. It is a pleasant and 
highly commendable custom, and has but the single disadvantage of sometimes happen- 
ing on a day that proves stormy. If such an accident happens, the next pleasant day 
should be devoted to the business, and in all cases the holes should be all previously dug, 
so as to expedite business and secure the largest possible result. In cases where trees are 
dug up and their planting is delayed from any cause, as will sometimes unavoidably 
happen where they are sent from distant nurseries, the roots should be "heeled in " by 
placing them in trenches and lightly covering them with soil. In every case it is a good 
plan to keep the roots covered from the air as much as possible while out of the ground, 
using cloths, straw, hay, dead leaves, moss, soU, or any other covering most convenient. 



AN AKBORETTJM. 

An arboretum is a collection of living trees, planted in as great variety as the soil and 
climate will permit. The trees shonld be placed ia groups, so that the oaks, maples, 
birches, pines, spruces, firs, cedars, &c., maybe adjacent, generally one of each species and 
sometimes in great variety, for in most of the cultivated trees many variations from the 
original form have been produced by accident or have appeared under cultivation. A 
variety, or "sport," maybe propagated v?ithout limit by grafting, budding, or layers, 
but never forms a separate species. In other cases hybrids are produced by accidental 
cross-fertilization, but both hybrids and varieties, where they bear seeds, tend to pro- 
duce plants of the original types. 

No institution of learning in the country, having grounds sufficiently ample, should be 
without plantations of this kind, which should always be labelled with their botanical 
and common names. They are also of first importance in city parks and public grounds, 
and it is to be earnestly hoped that at no distant day they may be found wherever there 
is opportunity in these places. 

COLLECTIONS. 

There is no school-house in the country, whether in city and village or rural district, 
which might not have at slight expense an interesting collection of the native woods of the 
vicinity. These specimens should be prepared by having one or more fa«es planed and 
polished or varnished to show the grain of the wood when worked to best advantage, and 
another face simjij/y planed and left inats natural color. There should be some portion 
of the bark, and it would be still better if there were shown in connection with the wood 
dried specimens of the leaves and blossoms, the fruit, and theresinous or other products. 
Such collections made up by the scholars, and correctly labelled, under the care of the 
teachers, would become object lessons of first importance as an agency for instruction. 
They would aflbrd the most profitable kind of employment for the leisure hours, and 
might awaken a love of close observation and a thirst for ftirther knowledge that would 
ripen into the best of fruits. 

CONCLUSION. 

I have thus briefly touched upon some of the points that might be properly noticed 
under the head of planting upon school lots and the cultivation of a taste for rural 
ornament. The subject would bear ample enlargement, and it may be that the points 
here presented will lead to further thought in those who may read these pages. ^ 

In the presence of our rapidly wasting supplies, it must be evident to every sensible 
person that something should be done to economize what remains of our native forest 
products, and to provide by seasonable planting for future wants. It should be held as the 
duty and the privilege of those having charge of our public schools to set an example 
worthy of following by the planting of their grounds for the effect it may have upon 
those under instruction, aside from the amenities that they thus secure to their premises. 
The scholars now in their schools will in a few years be the owners of the lands around 
them, and since all our lands in most of the States belong to private owners, upon them 
will devolve whatever duties the necessities of the ftiture may impose in the way of 
planting for the supply of future wants. 
Eespectftilly yours, 

FRANKLIN B. HOUGH, 
Chief of Forestry Division, Department of Agriculture. 
Hon. John Eaton, 

Commissioner of Edtication. 

1 Fuller expression of Dr. Hough's views will be found in his various reports on forestry, published 
by the Department of Agriculture ; in the American Journal of Forestry, a monthly published by 
Robert Clarke & Co., of Cincinnati, which he edits; and in the Elements of Forestry, a manual, 
also published by Clarke & Co. — Commissioiteb. 



TEEES AND TEEE PLANTING, 

WITH EXEUCISES AND DIRECTIONS FOR THE 

CELEBRATION OF ARBOR DAY. 



PREPARED BY 



JOHN B. PEASLEE, 

SUPEBINTENDENT CINCINNATI PUBLIC SCHOOLS, 



WITH A PREFACE BY 



WARREN HIOEEY. 



OKKICERS 

OV THE 

Ohio Sj^aipb Fof^BSJin^Y fIssoGiAirioN 

KOR 1884. 



PRESIDENT, 
JUDGE WARREN HIGLEY. 

VICE-PRESIDENTS, 

HON. HORACE WILSON, 
GEN. DURBIN WARD, 
DR. A. T. KECKELER. 

SECRETARY, 
PROF. ADOLPH LEUE. 

TREASURER, 
JOHN H. McMAKIN. 

DIRECTORS, 

JOHN r,. PEASLEE, Ph. D., | WALDO F. BROWN, 

COL. A. E. JONES, I HON. LEOPOLD BURCKHARDT, 

-HON. EMIL ROTHE, ' DR. FRANCIS PENTLAND, 

HON. LEO WELTZ, 1 I. N. LA BOITEAFX. 

COMMITTEE ON ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 
JOHN B. PI:ASLEE, Pii. D., Chairman. 



HON. EMIL ROTHE, 
PROF. W. H. VENABLE, 
HON. LEO WELTZ, 
DR. FRANCIS PENTLAND, 



COL. A. E. JONES, 
REUBEN II. WARDER, 
WALDO F. BROWN, 
HON. CHARLES REEMELIN. 



COPYKIGHT, 1SS4, BY JOHN 1$. i'EASL.EE. 



PREFACE. 



The subject of this little pamphlet is one that is rapidly rising in 
favor with the business community and the political economists. 
From the attention that has been given it by the press, and the facts 
disseminated by societies like ours, the thoughtful, intelligent citizen 
who studies the causes of the decline in national resources — how coun- 
tries once famous for tlieir fertility of soil and salubrity of climate and 
dense population have become desolate wastes, unfitted for the habita- 
tion of man — liow some countries have checked the rapid ten- 
dency to such desolation and ruin, and recovered their former prosper- 
ity — will see that the forests played the most important part in these 
caases ; that their denudation was followed by the decline, and then 
the destruction of the national resources, while their replanting resulted 
in reclaiming, and in renewed production. The various and imme- 
diate uses to man of trees and their products have caused their rapid 
destruction, until the threatened dearth in this country is becoming 
alarming. This can be avoided only by convincing those who are 
most directly interested of the undeniable facts, and thereby induc- 
ing the people to better protect existing forests, and to take early 
steps to plant new ones for the benefit of themselves and of future 
generations. 

In a country like ours, where the 'people own the land and where 
the farmer has to look to the products of the farm for his income, 
it is a question with him of profit as between the wood-lot and the 
cleared field, whether the wood shall remain to supply the fuel, the 
fence and necessary timber for home purposes, or whether it shall give 
place to the corn-field, the wheat-field, or the meadow. With good 
tillable soil, the profit is, no doubt, largely in favor of the open field, 
especially as compared with our native forests from which the most 
valuable trees have been culled, and only wood of an inferior quality 
left. But the result would bo quite different with a forest planted 
and cared for according to the principles of forestry as practiced in 
Germany and France, as conclusively appears in the following 
pages. There is, however, scarcely a farm of a hundred acres in 
Ohio and the originally wooded States, but that from 20 to 25 per 
cent of its surface can be more profitably devoted to tree culture than 
to any thing else. In fact, there is much of the best farming country 
that is useless for crops, as the farmer knows, and yet is well adapted 
to the growth of trees. These comparatively useless tracts should be 
planted to the right kind of trees, and the whole farm thereby made 
productive, while the influence of such planting and nurture, in 
beautifying the landscape, in rendering the country more salubrious, 

3 



4 I'RKFACK. 

the climate more equable, the iVuit crops surer, and the vegetable 
product larger, would gi'eatly enhance the moneyed value of the 
laud and render life far more enjoyable. 

Tile importance of forestry lias been recognized by tlie govern- 
ments of Europe for more tlian a century past. ^Schools of forestry 
have been established, and its principles reduced to a science. These 
are the result of necessity. The widespread destruction of the forests 
so affected the climate aud productions of the soil, and the wants and 
the nuimifacturing interests of the people, and the wealth and pros- 
perity of the nation, that the governments were forced to legislate and 
prevent the threatened destruction which Mas found to siu-ely follow 
the complete denudation of the forests. The most wholesome effects 
have resulted wherever a system of forestry has been introduced and 
followed. Unhealthy regions have been rendered salubrious; floods 
have been modified and partly conti'olled ; cro))S liave been rendered 
more certain; vast areas of waste-lands liave l)een forested and rendered 
productive in wood and timlier, whereby large revenues have been re- 
alized, and important interests sidiserved^ 

I know of no facts more convincing of the necessity for attention 
to forestry iu this country than those found in our last census report, 
from which I take the following figures: 

Partial Estimate of tiik Consumptiox of P'ouest Piiodicts as Fuel in 

TUE United States diking the Census Yeau 

Ending .May 31, 1880. 

Number of persons using wood for domestic fuel, 32,375,074 

estimated consumption of wood for domestic purposes. 

Number of cords for home use, . .... 140,537,439 Value, $306,950,040 

Bv railroads, - 1,971,813 " 5,126,714 

By steamboats, 787,862 " 1,812,083 

In mining and amalgamating the precious 

metals, 358,074 " 2,874,595 

In other mining operations, 266,771 " 673,692 

In the manufacture of brick and tile, . . . 1,157,522 " 3,978,331 

In the manufacture of salt, 540,448 " 121,681 

In the manufacture of wool, 158,208 " 425,239 

Total, 145,778,137 " $321,962,373 

CONSUMPTION OF CHARCOAL. 

In the twenty largest cities— Bushels, . . 4,319,194 Value, $521,316 

In manufacture of iron, " . . 69,592,091 " 4,726,114 
In the production of precious 

metals, " . . 97,687 " 29,306 

Total, 74,008,972 " $5,276,736 

In this table Ohio is estimated to consume for domestic purposes, 
exclusive of what is used in manufactures, 8,191,543 cords of wood, 
with au estimated value of $16,492,574. Allowing an averiige yield 
of forty cords to the acre, it requires 204,788 acres of forest to supply 
the demand in this State one vear for fuel alone. 



TRKFACE, 5 

The following are some of the statistics of the lumberiug industry 
of the United States for the year ending May 31, 1880: 

Cai.ital employed, $181,186,122 

Number of hands employed — Males, 141,564 

Females, 425 

Cliildren and youth, 5,967 

Value of logs. ..."..••• $i::',9,836,869 

Wages paid during the year, 31,845,974 

Feet of lumber (board measure) produced, 18,091.356,000 

Number of laths 1,761,788,000 

Number of shingles, 5,555,046,000 

Nulnber of staves, 1,248,226,000 

Number of headings, 146,523,000 

Feet of spool and bobbin stock (board measure), . . 34,076,000 
Value of all other products, • ■ $2,682,668 

Total value of all products, .* $233,367,729 

The lumbering interest of Oliio for the year ending May ol, 1880, 
is estimated as follows: 

Capital invested, $7,9-14,412; number of hands employed, 15,277; 
value of logs, $8,603,127; wages paid during the year, "$1,708,300; 
feet of luml)er (board measure), 910,832 000; number of laths, 
50.(525,000 ; number of shingles, 24,875,000 ; number of staves, 
214,245,000; number of sets of headings, 25,779,000; value of all 
the Uunber products of Ohio (estimated), $13,86-^,460. This, added 
to the estimated value of wood u.^ed for domestic purposes— to wit, 
$8,191,543 — gives a total value of the product of the State for the 
census year of 1880, $22,056,003; and tliis consumption is ra])idly 
increasing through the demands of our growing population. 

A comparison of the census returns of 1870 and 1880 shows a 
decrease of wood lands in the belt including latitude 37 degrees to 40 
degrees, tlirough which runs tlie Ohio River, extending westward 
across the Mi.ssissippi River, of from 34 to 26 per cent, being greatest 
in Ohio and Indiana. 

At the meeting of the Forestry Congress in Cincinnati, April, 
1882, Dr. Franklin B. Hough, then chief of the Forestry Department, 
read a valuable paper on "Tree Planting by Railroad Companies," 
in which he says : 

" We have in the United States about 100,000 miles of railroads. The 
number of ties to a mile range from 2,200 to 3,000, and in some cases as high 
as 3j500. If we assume an average of 2,500 to the mile, we have a quarter 
of a billion in use. They average eight feet in length, and about seven 
inches deep and eight inches wide, giving the contents of almost three cubic 
feet apiece, or in all 6,000,000 of cords. If piled conl-fashion, they would form 
a pile four feet high, eight feet wide, and 4,575 miles long. Placed end to 
end, they would span the earth fifteen times at the equator, or in one line 
would reach miles beyond tlie moon. Taking the average life of a tie at 
from five to eight years, and we sball need from 30,000,000 to 50,000,000 
new ties a year for maintaining tlie present railroads of the country in con- 
stant use. Allowing 500 ties to the acre, we shall need to cut from 60,000 
to 100,000 acres every year to meet this demand. To grow trees to the size 
necessary for ties will require an average of about thirty years, and we shall 
need, to keep up tliis supply, nearly 3,000,000 acres of forests, or about 



6 PRKFACH. 

2,500 acres for every hun(lre<l miles of road. This is equivalent to a beU 
of woodland twelve and one-half rod« wide along the road, or about three 
timee the right of way." 

In a recent article on the condition of our forests and their effect 
upon the floods of 1883 and 1884, Dr. Hougii says: 

"Let us now see how these forest supplies stiind, and how the future 
promises, with regard to their eontinuance in the Unite<i States. We have 
as our only data the census of different periods; and the returns of 1880 
show that, of our States and Tenitories, 9 had reduced their woodlands to 
below 10 per cent ; 5, to between 10 and 20 per cent ; 8, to from 20 to 30 
per cent ; 11, to from 30 to 40 per cent ; and 4, to from 40 to 50 per cent, when 
this census was taken. In 10 States of the South and South-west the pro- 
portion was 50 i)er cent or more, and in the whole United States the wood- 
lands occupied 35 per cent of the whole reported area. 

"In Ohio the returns made by assessors (which appear to be very relia- 
ble) show the tendencies of clearing in a very strong liglit, and taking three 
periods for comparison we get the following results : 

Acres of Decrease Percentage 

,, , from former ot woodland to 

wooaiana. period. total ai ea. 

• 1853 13,091,228 .... 55.27 

1870 9,749,333 4,241,895 38.51 

1881 4,708,247 5,041,086 22.71 

"In 1881, 001,136 acres, or about 3 per cent (not included in the wood- 
lands), were lying waste. 

"The amount of clearing, from 1870 to 1881, is shown to have been 5,041,- 
083 acres, and at this rate it becomes an easy question to solve as to how 
long the remaining 4,708,247 acres will last. We have not figures to prove 
that tliese rates of clearing have been going on in tlie other states bordering 
upon the Ohio river, or supplying it by their drainage; but the connection 
between this denudation and the floods of the present and of recent years 
can not be mistaken. Last year the damages were estimated at $60,000,000. 
There may have been less damage done this year (although the flood was 
five feet higher), because there was less property to destroy. In a lettc^r 
from a friend in Marietta we are told that four hundred houses floated past 
that place in the recent flood, which probably took off many that were not 
reached by the waters before. 

''Nine years ago a million of dollars or more of property was destroyed 
at Rochester by a flood unquestionably occasioned primarily by the exten- 
sive clearings in recent years around the head waters of the Genesee River. 
The heavy rains and warm winds, which rapidly melted the snows and sup- 
plied the floods on that occasion, could not have had so immediate an effect 
in a wooded country. 

" Passing from Winter floods, we find the other extreme in Summer 
droughts, which in recent years have become more frequent and distressing 
than were known in former years, and both may be traced unerringly to the 
same cause— the clearing-off of the woodlands which formerly tended to 
equalize these extremes and maintain a more uniform flow of waters through- 
out the year." 

THE OHIO STATE FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 

The origin of the State Forestry Association, together with a brief 
history of tlie popular movement that led to its organization, may be 
of interest in tliis place. 

In November, 1881, a public reception was given by the citizt>ns 
of Cincinnati to the von Stcubens, while on their visit tln-ough the 
country, after having taken part in the centennial celebration of the 



PREFACE. i 

battle of Yorktown. Among them w:i.s Bnnm Richaixl von Steuben^ 
the Royal Chief Forester of the Gernuui Empire, who made a most 
favorable impression upon those with whom he came in contact and 
deeply intere.ste<l them by his talks on forestry. 

In the early part of January following, a few of the gentlemen '^ 
who had been most active in this reception, met in my office and 
discussed, among other things, the duties of the Royal Chief Forester 
of Germany and the subject of forestry in genenU. The more we 
discussed the greater the interest became, and the more apparent it was 
that a popular movement should be iuaugunited to bring the subject 
to the earnest consideration of the people. Before we separated it 
was resolved to call a meeting of some of the public-spirited citi- 
zens and put the ball in motion. Accordingly a committee was 
organized, and for the next three mouths the press of the country 
laid before the people the subject of forestry in its various important 
aspects. 

The work of the committee culminated in a three days' meeting at 
Music Hall, April 25th, 26th, and 27th, at which most'of the distin- 
guished foresters of this country and Canada were present and read 
papers before the scientific department. The excellent programme 
for this meeting at Music Hall was prepared principally by Dr. John 
A. Warder, and Prof Adolph Leue. Governor Foster made the 
address of welcome. The public schools were dismissed on the 26tli 
and 27th to enable the teachers and pupils to take part in the cele- 
bration of tree-planting in the public parks. The 27th liad been ap- 
pointed as Arbor Day by proclamation of the governor. Extensive 
preparations had been made for its appropriate celebration in Eden 
Pai'k. The city was in holiday attire. The soldiery and organized 
companies of citizens formed an immense procession under command 
of Col. S. A. Whitfield and marched to the park, where the command 
was turned over to Col. A. E. Jones, the officer in charge. The school 
children were under the charge of Superintendent Peaslee. Fifty thou- 
sand citizens covered the grassy slopes and crowning ridges, those assigned 
to the work of tree-planting taking their respective places. At the 
firing of the signal gun, "Presidents' Grove," "Pioneers' Grove,'" 
"Battle Grove," " Citizens' Memorial Grove," and " AuthoiV Grove,'' 
were planted and dedicated with loving hands and appropriate cere- 
monies. Addresses w^ere made by ex-Governor Noyes, Dr. Loring, 
Cassius M. Clay, Gen. Durbin AYard, and others. No sight more beau- 
tiful, no ceremonies more touching, had ever been witnessed in Cin- 
cinnati. An important les.son in forestry had, indeed, been brought 
home to the hearts of the people, and a crown of success was awarded 
the American Forestry Uongi'ess. This was the first Arbor Da)^ 
celebration in Ohio. And thus closed the first session of the Amer- 
ican Forestry Congress, which embraces in its scope the United States 
and Canadas. 

In January, 1888, the Ohio State Forestry Association, the out- 

*NoTE. — The gentlemen present at this conference were Col. W. L. De 
Beck, Rev. Dr. Max Lilienthal, Supt. John B. Peaslee, Hon. John Simp- 
kinson, the first jiresident of the Association, Col. A. E. Jones, and Hon. 
Emil Keith e. 



8 prp:face. 

growth of the American Forestry Congress, was organized. The or- 
ganizers were Dr. John A. AVarder, Prof. Adolph Leue, Col. A. E. 
Jones, Hon. John Himpkinson, Supt. John B. Peaslee, Gen. Durbin 
Ward, Hon. Emil Rothe, Hon. Leopold Burckhardt, D. D. Thomp- 
son, Prof R, B. Warder, Prof Adolph Strauch, Dr. A. D. Birchard, 
Hon. Charles Reemelin, Prof W. H. Venable, Dr. W. W. Dawson, 
John H. McMakin, Esq., myself, and perhaps a few others. The 
work of the previous year was largely repeated. A convention was 
held in April, at which many valuable papers were read, some of 
which were printed in full in the daily papers. 

By authority of a joint resolution adopted by both branches of 
our State Legislature, Governor Foster issued his proclamation, ap- 
pointing the fourth Friday in April as Arbor Day, which was the last 
day of our convention. Accordingly, our association had made ex- 
tensive preparations for its celebration in Eden Park by the citizens 
and by the public schools. 

I can give no better idea of this second celebration of Arbor Day 
in Cincinnati than by quoting from au article that appeared the fol- 
lowing morning in one of our leading journals : 

" The east ridge of the park was thronged with the associations plant- 
ing tablets to the memories of the Presidents of the United States, the 
heroes of Valley Forge, and the pioneers of Cincinnati in their respective 
groves, while the northern projecting slope of the ridge was occupied by 
fully seventeen thousand school children in honoring 'Authors' Grove.' 
Viewed from the summit of the ridge immediately west, the sight was one 
of the most animating ever brought before the eyes of Cincinnatians. The 
entire ridge, nearly a third of a mile in length, was occupied by those per- 
sons taking part in the tirst-named c«>remonies, while the slope designated 
was occupied by a dense mass of gayly dressed children in active motion 
over a surface of about five acres, and whose voices, wafted across the deep 
hollow to the western ridge, sounded like the chattering from a grove full 
of happy birds. The eastern sloi)e of the west ridge was occupied by three 
tliousand or four thousand spectators, who, reclining on the green Si)ring 
sod of the grassy slopes, quietly surveyed the scene from a distance. In 
all, there were over twenty thousand persons present. Before the exercises 
commenced a number of interesting photographic views were taken of tlie 
immense crowd, and others were taken after the children of the various 
schools had formed their circles around their respective trees along the 
slope of Authors' Grove, and they formed a j)icture of twenty-five or thirty 
circles of humanity around tha young trees, with the populace massed be- 
tween. Over in the center of the east ridge was the speakers' stand, with 
a tall staff bearing the national colors rising from the center, while smaller 
liags marked the trees dedicated to each author. The trees and tablets in 
all the various groves had been previously planted, so that yesterday was 
but a dedication day of the planting. The grove to the honor of Cincinnati 
pioneers had been jilanted l)y the association, and yesterday the tablet was 
laid to their memory. All the tablets were of uniform size and construc- 
tion, each being of sandstone, twenty-fi)ur by thirty-six inches surface, and 
eleven inches depth. That for tlie Cincinnati pioneers contained at the 
upper center a figure of the primitive log-cabin, and the following inscrip- 
tion, 'Planted and Dedicated to the INIemory of the Pioneers of Cincinnati 
by the Forestry Society.' Below were cut the names of the pioneers. 

'" Presidents ' Grove ' bore a tablet with the following inscription: 
' Presidents' Grove, Planted and Dedicated to the Memory of the Presi- 
'\'nts of the United States, l>y the Forestry Society, 1882, "Cincinnati, April 
:::7th.' Then followed tiie names of all the twenty-one Presidents, down to 
President Arthur. 



PREFACE. 9 

"'Centennial Grove' Mas planted in 187(5 by Colonel A. E. Jones, from 
trees bi-ought from Valley Forge. The tablet he had laid yesterday was 
dedicated to the heroes who served with Washington at Valley Forge. Fol- 
lowing is the inscription : Eagle bearing the scroll ' Centennial Grove. Ded- 
icated to the memory of 1776, and the patriots who suffered with Washing- 
ton at Valley Forge, brought from that historic ground and planted by 
A. E. Jones, April 27, 1876.' Then followed the names Washington, Knox, 
Lafayette, Greene, Hamilton, Gates, Wayne, Putnam, H. Lee, Steuben, 
Weldin, Muhlenburg, Sullivan, Stark, Warren, Mcintosh, Potter, Maxwell, 
AVoodward, Patterson, Allen, De Kalb, Kosciusko, INIarion, C. Lee, Glover, 
Poor, Larned, Scott, Pulaski, Sumter, Lincoln, Morgan, Smallwood, Eber- 
hardt. 

" Place was left upon each tablet for additional names. The Forestry 
Association planted a pin-oak tree to the memory of the late Adolph 
Strauch, superintendent of Sprmg Grove Cemetery. This was his favorite 
tree, and a year ago he expressed the hope that if any tree should ever be 
planted to his memory, it should be a pin-oak. It was appropriately draped 
in mourning, and labeled. An imported horse-chestnut was planted to the 
memory of Rev. Dr. Lilienthal by the German Pioneer Association. Both 
occupy prominent positions on the summit and center of the east ridge. 

'' At eleven o'clock the school exercises commenced at ' Authors' 
Grove.' These exercises were outlined by Superintendent Peaslee in the 
assignment of authors to the respective schools, and the programmes were 
tilled out by the principals. The trees having previously been planted, 
small granite tablets, about eight inches square, bearing tlie name of the 
author honored and the date of the ceremony, were sunk, in most cases 
imiformly with the surface of the sod, in the immediate vicinity of the tree. 
Thus the exerci.ses were dediaitory only. 

" Following was the order of the school exercises, each of which in- 
cluded a sketch of the author designated, appropriate songs, and the reci- 
tation of selections from the author's works." 

Here follows a detailed account of the part each school took in the 
exercises. 

These were tlie first memorial groves ever planted iu America — the 
■first public planting of trees in honor of the memory of authors, 
statesmen, .soldiers, pioneers, and other distinguished citizens. 

Superintendent Peaslee, as chairman of the Arhor Day Com- 
mittee, })repared a circular addressed to trustees, superintendents, and 
teachers of Ohio, requesting them to celebrate Arbor Day after the 
Cincinnati plan, which was outlined in the circular. This document 
was sent to all parts of Oiiio, and to other States, and I am happy to 
know that iu many places in Ohio and in adjoining States, tree- 
planting Avas celebrated according to this plan. The entire school sys- 
tem of West Virginia, under the inspiration of her enterprising State 
superintendent, B. L. Butcher, responded to this sentiment, and cel- 
ebrated tree-planting after the manner set forth in our circular. 
One of the leading journals of England has lately recommended the 
introducticm of the Cincinnati plan of tree-planting celebrations into 
the public schools of Great Britain. 

There is a German proverb which says "what you would have ap- 
pear in the nation's life you must introduce into the public schools." 

It is gratifying to know that the efforts made iu Cincinnati in be- 
half of forestry are duly appreciated abroad by men distinguished 
for their attainments in forestral science. Prof. Adolph Leue, our 
secretary, a scientific forester by education, sent several packages (of 
100 trees each), of the Catalpa q->eci()Aa to different parts of Europe 



10 PKEFACJ-:. 

accompanied with requests to plant them on "Arbor Day," April 27, 
1882. These requests were com})lie(] with. Prof. Dr. F. Judeich, 
the celebrated director of the "Royal Forest Academy," of Tharandt, 
Saxony — the most renowned forest academy in the world — informed 
Prof. Leue that the trees sent by him were plante<l by the academv 
near tlie famous grove of beech known as " Tharandt's Heilige Hul- 
len," and that the grove they form is dedicated to "Cincinnati Arlxtr 
Day," and is called the "Cincinnati Arbor Grove." The Catalpa speci- 
osa is a purely American tree, described and named by Dr. John A. 
Warder, and this is its first introduction into Europe. 

NECROLOGY. 

Eev. Max Lilienthal, D. D., the distinguished and eloquent 
rabbi of the Mound Street Temple, of this city, was among the first 
of our zealous workers in the promotion of the interests of forestry. 
He was a wise counselor, a profound scholar, an earnest leader, a de- 
voted friend. His last public utterances were made before the com- 
mittee which was then arranging for the organization of the Forestry 
Congress. He died suddenly, in the Spring of 1882, leaving a va- 
cancy in the list of our officers ever to be mourned. 

Prof. Adolph Strauch, the superintendent of Spring Grove 
Cemetery, and the first man who introduced the principles of laud- 
scape gardening, in the management of cemeteries, was also one of 
our most active officers. Recognized as one of the first arboriculturists 
in America, and the man to whom is the credit of giving to Cincin- 
nati her renown for beautiful suburbs, Avith landscapes as lovely as a 
dream, he was generally beloved. He died in April, 1883, during the 
session of our Forestry Association. 

Dr. John A. Warder, the honorary president of our association, 
died at his beautiful home, at North Bend, Ohio, in July, 1883. His 
love for nature seems to hare been born in him. His eai'ly surround- 
ings and associations were powerful allies in his education as a nat- 
uralist. He read and studied and mastered the Book of Nature in its 
varied teachings as but few have mastered it. A seed, a bud, a 
leaf, a plant, a branch, a tree, a shell, a rock, attracted his notice 
and elicited investigation. He was .a veritable student of Nature, and 
his life among men was as lovingly beautiful as it was among his 
plants aud his trees. 

His work in the great West for the encouragement of tree-planting, 
and in other parts of the country, and his varied and extensive writ- 
ings on subjects pertaining to forestry, are well known in this country 
and in Europe. He is justly called the Father of American forestry. 

Kind, generous, loving, hopeful, enthusiastic, full of accurat/C , 
knowledge which he was ever ready to impart, teachable in spirit and 
teaching in life, he elevated and biassed his race. 

The forests will sing his requiem and future generations will call 
him blessed. 

WARREN HIGLEY, 

PresiderU oj Ohio State Forestry Association. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The time has come when the people of Ohio must wake up to the 
importance of preserving our forests and of planting trees, or our 
State will suffer the terrible consequences of this neglect before another 
half century has passed away. Hon. Emil Kothe, who has given the 
subject much study, in speaking of Ohio before the American Forestry 
Congress at Cincinnati in 1882, said: "Let the hills be deprived of 
the rest of the protection which the fu-ests afford, and half the area 
of our State will be sterile in less than fifty years." "The wealth, 
beauty, fertility, and healthfulness of the country," as Whittier justly 
says, "largely depend upon the conservation of our forests and the 
planting of trees." How can these truths be impressed most effectively 
upon the minds of our people? In the first place, forestry associations 
should be organized in every city, town, village, and country school 
district in the State, whose object shall be to plant trees along streets, 
by the road-sides, in parks and commons, around public buildings, in 
waste places; to distribute information in regard to trees and forests 
among the people, and to encourage tree-planting in every way possil)le. 
These associations, in conjunction with the schools, should liold tree- 
planting celebrations from year to year, but where such associations 
are not formed, the schools should conduct the exercises. The youth 
of our State must be instructed in the value and utility of foreste — 
their influence upon climate, soil, productions, etc. — correct sentiment 
in regard to trees muyt be implanted in them if the best interests of 
the State in regard to forestry are to be subserved ; and the most im- 
pressive and attractive means of imparting the instruction, and of 
interesting the pupils in the subject, is through the celelirution of 
tree-planting. It is also the surest and best way of calling the atten- 
tion of the people at large to it. The object of the celebration is to 
instill into the minds of children and older citizens correct sentiments 
in regard to trees, and to store their minds with information relating 
to forestry, and to the distinguished individuals in whose honor or 
memory each tree, or group, is planted, for we would have all the 
trees around which the celebrations take place dedicated to great 
authors, statesmen, soldiers — in brief, to famous men and women, 
whose lives have reflected honor upon our country; to the pioneers 
and distinguished citizens of each township, village, or city, as the 
ease may be, and thus "make trees" as Holmes says, "monuments 
of history and character." 

In every place where sufficient grounds can be obtained, either in 
public parks or elsewhere, we Avould have memorial groves plant^'il, 
and tlie "Arbor Day Celebrations" take place in tliem. Let there be 
a " Citizens' Memorial Grove," in which trees shall be planted from 
year to year by loving hands of the relatives and friends of those who 
have died; let there be a "Pioneers' Grove," in which all citizens, 

11 



12 INTRODUCTION. 

young and old, shall annually join in paying just tribute to the mem- 
ory of those who endured the hardships and ju-ivations of a pioneer life. 

" They vanish from us, one by one. 
In death's unhghted realm to sleep ; 
And O ! degenerate is the son 

Who would not some memorial keep." 

Let there be an "Authors' Grove," in which the school children 
shall honor, by living monuments, the great men and women in liter- 
ature, so that while they learn to love and reverence trees they will, 
at the same time, become interested in the lives and writings of dis- 
tinguished and worthy authors. Let there be a Soldiers' Grove, devoted 
to the memory of our patriotic dead. Yes, 

Plant beautiful trees in honor of those 

Whose memory you revere, 
And more beautiful still they'll become 

W^ith each revolving year. 

And what monuments the trees, the monarchs of the vegetable 
world, become ! They are more durable than marble itself* Their 
grandeur will challenge the admiration of the beholder when the coe- 
val marble monument at their base will lie in ruins, defaced by age 
and crumbling into dust. Well may the great historian, Benson J, 
Lossing, ask, "What conqueror iu any part of 'life's broad field of 
battle' could desire a more beautiful, a more noble, a more patriotic 
monument than a tree, planted by pure and joyous children, as a 
memorial of his achievements? What earnest, honest worker, with 
hand and brain for the benefit of his fellowmen, could desire a more 
pleasing recognition of his usefuluess than such a monument, a symbol 
of his or her own productions, ever growing, ever blooming, and ever 
bearing wholesome fruit?" 

Should the annual celebration of tree-planting, the preparation for 
which affords ample opportunity for imparting all needful information 
in regard to trees and forestry, become general in our State, the time 
Avould not be far distant when such a public sentiment would be 
formed as Avould lead to the beautifying by trees of every city, town, 
and village in Ohio, as well as public highways, church and school 
grounds, and the homes of the people in the country. In truth, within 
the next twenty-five years thereafter the general aspect of many parts 
of the State .would be changed as has been that of Connecticut within 
the last few years through the instrumentality of her schools imder the 
leadership of Hon. B. G. Northrop, and of her " Improvement Socie- 
ties," which have been organized througli his efforts. Pastor Oberlin, 
after whom Oberlin College, of this State, is named, required each 
boy and girl, before he would administer the ordinance of confirmation, 
to bring a certificate that he or she had planted two trees. If but the 
youth of Ohio could be led to plant their two trees each, how by the 



*NoTE. — The natural age of the oak is from 1,500 to 2,000 years; of the 
elm from ?,50 to 500 years ; of the cypress, 350 years ; of the larch, 600 years ; 
of the yew tree, 2,500 to 3,000 years; of the maple from 600 to 800 years; of 
tlie cedar, 800 years; of tlie linden, 1,200 years. There are trees now stand- 
ing that are supposed to be over 5,000 years old. 



INTRODUCTION. 13 

children aloue could our great State be enriched and beautified withiu 
the next fifty years. 

Aijain, the trees which the cliildren phmt, or which they assist in 
dedicating, will become dearer to them as year after year rolls on. As 
the trees grow, and their branches expand in beauty, so will the love 
for them increase in the hearts of those by whom they were planted or 
dedicated, and long before the children reach old age they will almost 
venerate these green and living memorials of youthful and happy days; 
and as those who have loved and cared for pets will ever be the 
friends of our dimib animals, so will they ever be the friends of our 
forest trees. From the individual to the general, is the law of our 
nature. Show us a mail who in childhooil had a pet, and we '11 show 
you a lover of animals. Show us a person who in youth planted a tree 
that has lived and flourished, and we '11 show you a friend of trees and 
of forest culture. 

ARBOR DAY CELP:BRATI0N BY THE SCHOOLS. 

We suggest that the exercises consist of reading, by the pupils, 
compositions or essays on the importance and usefulness of forests; of 
reciting, individually and in concert, selections on trees from various 
authors; of giving extracts from, and sketches of, the life and writings 
of the particidar author in whose honor or memory each tree or group 
isplante<l; of singing; of the ceremony of tlirowing the soil, each 
pupil in turn, about the trees; and of appro]>riate talks by trustees, 
teachers, and others. 

It is intended to have the exercises indicated above take place 
while the pupils of each class, room, or school, as the case may be, are 
arranged around their respective trees or groups. At the conclusion of 
this part of the programme, let all the pupils come together and sing 
our national and other appropriate songs, and listen to short addresses 
by speakers selected for the occasion. All the exercises should not oc- 
cupy more than two hours, and at the expiration of that time the chil- 
dren should be permitted to enjoy their holiday (within proper limits, 
of course), after their own manner, on the green sod. Thus, "with 
the ceremony of a celebration, and with the attraction and pleasures 
to the young minds of a holiday, the exercises and what they symbolize 
will be deeply stamped upon the memory of the school children, and 
the entire effect upon them must prove to be of the most important 
and satisfactory character." 

In order to indicate more fully the character and scope of the 
Arbor Day celebrations, we will here give a brief description of the 
celebrations held by the public schools of Cincinnati in Eden Park. 
For a fuller detail of the same we refer you to the last two annual 
reports of the schools. 

About six acres were set apart in the park for a grove, now known 
as "Authors' Grove." Selections on trees and forestry from various 
authors were sent to the several schools to be memorized by the pupils ; 
also information concerning historic trees of our country, and many 
facts of history giving the effects upon climate, soil, production, etc., 
both of the destruction and the removal of forests were given to the 
scholars. These formed the basis of compositions in the upper grades. 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

In addition to tlie above, the teachers gave sketclies of the lives of 
their respective authors, and the pupils learned selections from their 
writings. In some of the schools the boys were organized into compa- 
nies, under the name of Forestry Cadets, or the "Emerson Forestry 
Cadets" of Hughes High School, the "Longfellow Forestry Cadets" 
of the Eleventh District School, the "Holmes Forestry Cadets" of 
the Twenty-second District School; the girls and boys not organized 
were called Foresters, as the " Franklin Foresters" of the Tenth District 
School, the " Whittier Foresters" of the Twenty -sixth District School, 
and so on. 

That the part taken by the pupils in the actual planting of the 
trees may not be misunderstood, I will state that experienced tree- 
planters did most of the work of setting out the trees previous to 
Arbor Day, and that the pui»ils finished the setting by filling around 
■each tree soil left in heaps for this purpose. 

On Arbor Day,* Authors' Grove was distinguished from the others 
(" Pioneers' Grove," " Battle Grove," "Presidents' Grove," " Citizens' 
Memorial Grove," for the celebration of tree-planting was going on at 
the same time in each of these groves), by a large blue flag, placed 
near the center of the grove, and by small flags of the same color 
placed around the grove. At a given signal the pupils, upwards of 
seven thousand in number (at the celebration last year there were 
more than seventeen thousand present), arranged themselves, each 
school around its special author's tree or group, and the exercises 
indicated above began. 

CELEBRATION EXERCISES. 

In order to furnish information to composition writers and to 
speakers, Part First of this pamphlet- contains lessons from history 
and other important facts. We earnestly request trustees, superin- 
tendents, and teachers to familiarize the older pupils under their charge 
with these facts, whether their schools celebrate tree-planting or not. 

Part Second contains extracts on trees from various authors, for 
■concert and individual recitation. It is not expected that they will 
all be recited at one celebration, but it is thought best to give a large 
variety from which to select. 

It was our intention at first to have this pamphlet consist of three 
parts; Part Third to contain sketches of the lives of a number of our 
great authors, and selections from their writings, but, after careful 
consideration, it has been decided not to add this, for two reasons. 
First, because it would make the pamphlet too large, and, second, be- 
cause sketches of the lives of our authoi's are found in our school 
readers, and beautiful selections from their writings can be made by 
the teachers with little difficulty. Of course the selections for this 
part of the programme need not be on trees or forestry. 

JOHN B. PEASLEE, 
Chairman Committee on Arbor Day Exercises. 



PART KIRST. 



LESSONS FROM HISTORY. 

And Other Kacts. 



PALESTINE. 

At the time when Joshua conquered the Promised Laud, milk and 
honey were tlowing into Canaan; that L?, it was a country of wonderful 
fertility, blessed with a deliglitful climate. Both ranges of the Leb- 
anon and its Spur Mountains were then densly covered with forests, in 
which the famous cedar predominated, that stately tree so masterly 
and poetically described by the psalmist and the prophets. The large 
and continually increasing population of Palestine enjoyed comfort and 
abundance during centuries. But the gradual devastation of the for- 
ests, which was finally completed by the Venetians and the Genoese, 
brought about a general deterioration of the country. The hills of Gal- 
ilee, once the rich pasturing grounds for large herds of cattle, are now 
sterile knobs. Tlie Jordan became an insignificant stream, and the sev- 
eral beautiful smaller rivei-s, mentioned in the Bible, now appear as stony 
runs, leading ofi'the snow and rainwater, but being completely dry dur- 
ing the greater part of the year. Some few valleys, in which the fer- 
tile soil washed down from tjie hills, was deposited, have retained their 
old fertility, but the few cedar trees remaining as a landmark around 
the Maronite convent on the rocky and barren Lebanon, look lonely 
and mournfully upon an arid and desolate country, not fit to sustain 
one-sixth of such a population as it contained at the time of Solomon. 

EMIL EOTIIE. 

GERMANY. 

The progress made by Germany in tree planting is but a part of her 
general progress. The credit is given to the great Frederick; it was 
part of the national policy of his day which raised Prussia from a small 
power to a great one, and to the energetic continuance of that policy, 
Germany owes Sadowa aiid Sedan. By this forethought, vast armies 
have been maintained, where once the sandy deserts would not nourish a 
flock of goats, and successive regiments of hardy soldiers have poured forth 
from the fertile soil where, two hundred years ago, the rugged debris 
of wiuter torrents, the thorn and the thistle, overspread a thirsty and 
impoverished land. R. vv. phipps.* 



*NoTE. — The articles credited to Mr. R. W. Phipps, of Toronto, Can- 
ada, were taken from liis report to the Canadian Government; those cred- 
ited to Hon. Emil Rotlie, from the Pnx;eedings of the American Forestry 
Congress, pubhshed in the report of the Toronto Fruit Growers' Association. 
Both of these reports are exceedingly valuable. J. b. p. 



16 TREES AND TREJI-PLANTING. 

PKOVrXCE OF DttBEN, SAXONY. 

In the Prussian [)r«)vince of Saxou}'., the town of Diibeu celebrates 
an annual festival. The forests surrounding it had been recklessly 
cleared, and the sand banks wliicii lay to the north-east bej^an at once 
to move. Long tracts of corn land were converted into a sandy \vaste. 
The waves of gritty particles began to overleap the hedges and over- 
flow the gardens under the walls of the town. Vegetal)les became 
scarce, pasture for cattle rare, and the most serious results were 
feared, when the forests of the district offered to arrest the desolating 
invasion. Fifty years have elapsed since then. Now, rich woods of 
acacias, birch, and pine wave over the sandy hills, and with their fine 
netwoi-k of rootlets, hold the restless sand in its place and compel it to 
quiescence. Every year the citizens of Diiben turn out. with music 
and banners, into the woods, and celebrate with great jubilation the 
salvation of their town. s. baring gould. 

FRANCE. 

In France the aristocrats had preserved the forests. But when 
Jacques Bonhomrae had overthrown their tyranny he proceeded to 
destroy the groves and forests, and in a short time he succeeded in 
almost staying crop growth- in the fields adjacent. AViser councils 
now ])revail ; experience has borne its fruits, and the French forests, 
particularly near the sea, bear witness how rapidly Providence assists 
a liberal, how sternly she repays a greedy and grasping, cultivator. 

PHIPPS. 

SPAIN. 

Un(ler the reign of the Moorish caliphs the Iberian peninsula re- 
sendjled a vast garden, yielding grain and fruit, of every known 
variety, in the most perfect quality, and in endless abundance, and 
thickly populated by a highly cultivated people. But then the sierras 
and mountain slopes were covered with a luxuriant growth of timber, 
which was afterwards wantonly destroyed under the rule of the kings. 
Lai'ge herds of half-wild goats and sheep prevented the spontaneous 
growth of trees on the neglected lands. Now nearly all the plateau- 
lands of Spain, being fully one- third of the entire area, are desert-like 
and unfit for agriculture, because of the scarcity of rain and the 
want of water. Another one-third of the territory is covered with 
worthless shrubs and thorn-bushes, and affords a scanty pasture for 
the merino sheep, the number of which is decreasing from year to 
year. The once delicious climate has become changeable and rough, 
since there are no more forests to break the power of the scorching 
Salano and the cold Galego wind. The average depth of the fine 
rivers that cross Spain in all directions has greatly diminished. The 
government, well aware of the causes of the deterioration of the soil 
and climate, has lately made earnest efforts, partly to replant the old 
forest grounds, but has met with little success,. it being very difficult to 
make trees grow on former tindier land, wdiich has been lying waste 
for a longer time. It will take a full century's time and necessitate an 
immense outlay of money to restock Spain with sufficient timber. 

ROTHK. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 17 

Spain is very deficient in woodland. The evils of denudation are 
perhaps nowhere more signally exemplified thai' in Spain. Rentzsh 
goes so fiir as to ascribe the political decadence of Spain wholly to the 
destruction of the forests. A school of forestry has been lately estab- 
lished in Escorial, and good results from the training there may be. 
lioped for. — Encyclopcedia Britannica. 

THE EASTERN COAST OF THE ADRIATIC SEA. 

On the entire eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, in Dalmatia, 
Herzegovina, and Montenegro, the same evil consequences of the de- 
vastation of the natural forests are clearly perceptible. These coast 
lands were very fertile until the Romans, having used up their own 
timber, took it from the other side of the Adriatic, and until millions 
of Illyric trees were converted into pillars and rammed into the lagu- 
nas to make foundations for the houses, palaces, and churches of 
Venice. What was left by the lumbermen was destroyed by the 
camp-fires of careless herdsmen, and here also the goats did their 
pernicious work in preventing spontaneous growth. The long moun- 
tain range running along the coast, which was yet well timl)ered iu 
the time of the great Ccmstantine, is now destitute of all soil ; the 
naked lime-roads, reflecting the hot rays of the sun, warn the stranger 
not to enter the sterile and inhospitable country, hardly worth the loss 
of human life and treasure which the subjection of its unruly inhabit- 
ants now costs the house of Hapsburg. rothe. 

SICILY. 

Let us look at Sicily, once the great grain reservoir for Rome. 
Since the island of plenty was despoiled of its forests, it gradually lost 
its fertility and the mildness of its climate. The ruins of proud and 
opulent Syracuse lay in a desert, covered by sand, which the hot 
sirocco carried over the Mediterranean Sea from Africa. A few iso- 
lated, well-watered, and carefully cultivated districts of very limited 
extension, is all that is left to remind the tourist of the by-gone glory 

of Sicily. KOTHE. 

PYRENEES MOUNTAINS. 

The desolation of mountain regions by the clearing of forests is 
strikingly illustrated in the Pyrenees. Formerly the plains were cul- 
tivated, and inundations were much less frequent and less destructive 
than nowadays. As roads came to be opened the profit from sheep 
and cattle became greater, and the clearing of forests was begun to 
make room for pasturage and, to some extent, for timber, until by 
degrees the slopes of the mountains were denuded, and the rains, hav- 
ing nothing to hinder, began to form eroding torrents, the south slopes 
suffering most, because first cleared and directly exposed to the sun's 
heat. The extremes of flood and drouth became excessive, and ex- 
tensive tracts have been ruined for present occupation from this source. 

PHIPPS. 



18 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

ITALY. 

When the Apennine and Sabinian Mountain range and its slopes 
were covered with its natural growth of trees, the now detested Roman 
Campagnas, which constitute the largest part of the Pontine swamps, 
were a beautiful section of country. They were then adorned with 
sumptuous Summer residences, villas, parks, flower and fruit gardens of 
the Roman aristocrats. After the destruction of the forests, the whole 
region became unhealthy, and almost absolutely uninhabitable on ac- 
count of the malarious gases emanating from the soil. Formerly, these 
were absorbed by the leaves of numerous trees ; now they fill the air 
and infect even the very heart of St. Peter's eternal city, rothe. 

Within a few years a portion of these swamps have been planted 
with eucalyptus trees, and they have had a wonderful effect on the 
healthfulness of the atmosphere, and j^eople now reside in these parts 
during the Summer, where but a short time ago it was impossible to 
live. The eucalyptus tree is now being introduced into the everglades 
of Florida in order to purify the air in these unhealthy regions of 
the State. J. b. p. 

ISLAND OF ASCENSION. 

The Island of Ascension furnishes another remarkable instance. 
This island, some seven and a half miles long and six wide, was entirely 
barren when first occupied in 1815, and so destitute of Avater that 
supplies were brought from England and the Cape of Good Hope. 
Means have since been taken to plant trees and to introduce agricul- 
ture on the island, though not to any great extent. The effect has 
been remarkable. The island grows forty kinds of trees where but 
one grew in 1843, owing to want of water. The water supply is ex- 
cellent, and the garrison and ships visiting the Island are supplied in 
abundance with vegetables of various kinds. phipps. 

CEYLON. 

In his report to the Earl of Kimberly, Dr. J. D. Hooker, of the 
Royal Kew Gardens, says: "The presence of forests plays a most 
important part in storing the rainfall and yielding up gradually to the 
streams a continuous supply of Avater, a thing, I need hardly say, in a 
hot country of primary importance. Moreover, the rain is retained 
by forests on the surface of the ground ; it gradually permeates to the 
subsoil, and so feeds the underground water-bearing strata upon which 
springs and wells must eventually depend. If the forest is indiscrim- 
inately removed the rain runs off as it falls, and washes away the 
superficial and fertile soil with it. The mischief already done in 
Mauritius and various West India Islands is so widely spread (being 
in some, indeed, irreparable), that I venture to press upon your lord- 
ship my own opinion as to the urgency of active steps being taken in 
the case of an island so beautiful and at present so fertile as Ceylon. 
I have lately received an account of the deterioration of the climate of 
some of the Leeward Islands, which affords a melancholy confirma- 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 19 

tion of what I have urged above. The contrast between neighboring 
islands similarly situated is most striking. The sad change which has 
befallen the smaller ones is due to human agency alone. It is reported 
of these that in farmer times they were clothed with dense for- 
ests, and their older inhabitants remembered when the rains were 
abundant and the hills and all uncultivated places were shaded by ex- 
tensive groves. The removal of the trees is the cause of the present 
evil. The opening of the soil to the vertical sun rapidly dries up the 
moisture. Without shade upon the surface, the water is rapidly ex- 
haled, and spriugs and streams are dried up." 

ST. HELENA. 

The Island of St. Helena, the well-known scene of Napoleon's ban- 
ishment, furnishes a remarkable illustration of the connection that 
exists between forests and rainfall. When first discovered, in 1502, it 
had heavy forests. The introduction of goats, and other causes, 
destroyed these woodlands, until the island was almost denuded. The 
consequences were that in the records of the last century we find ac- 
counts of repeated and almost periodical visitations of very severe 
drought, occasioning various losses to cattle and crop efforts. Towards 
the end of the last century, however, the governor saw the need of 
strenuous efforts. Gardeners were sent for, and trees from all parts 
of the world were planted, without regard to their character. The 
"Piuas Pinaster" was sown very extensively, and several plantations 
of this still exist. The consequences of this were discovered a few 
years ago as follows: "For many years past, since the general growth 
of our trees, we have been preserved from the scourge, and droughts 
such as were formerly recorded are now altogether unknown. Our 
fall of rain is now equal to that of England, and is spi-ead almost 
evenly over the year." phipps. 

ISLAND OF SANTA CRUZ. 

The famous West Indian island of Santa Cruz is at the present 
moment suffering from the vandalism of its inhabitants ; its eastern 
portion, which twenty-seven years since was rich, populovis, and of 
tropical luxuriance, now deprived of its forests, has become dry, arid, 
and worthless. It is found to be too late to retrieve the previous error, 
for, of a thousand trees recently planted upon an estate on this island, 
not one survived. The facts in regard to the island of Curacoa are 
still more interesting : " In the year 1845 it was found to be an almost 
perfect desert. Where, according to the testimony of the inhabitants, 
had once been a garden of fertility, abandoned i)lantations, the, recent 
ruins of beautifid villas and terraced gardens, and broad arid wastes, 
without a blade of grass, showed how sudden and complete a destruc- 
tion had fallen upon this unfortunate little island. The cause was the 
cutting-down of the trees for export of their valuable timber; the 
effect followed even more rapidly tlian at Santa Cruz, as the island 
lies five leagues further south, and the heat is more intense. The 
rains have almost entirely ceased. Almost within sight of Curacoa is 



20 TEEES AND TEEE-PLANTING. 

the coast of the Spanish main, covered with tlie rankest vegetation, 
over which the burdened clouds shower down abundant blessings." 
{From Report of Commmioners of State Park, New York: Hon. Horatio 
Seymour, chairman, and Verplank Colvin, secretary.^ 

ALGIERS, SAINT JAGO ISLAND. 

In Algiers marked changes in the climate have followed upon the 
deforesting of extensive tracts, and wonderful results have followed 
the systematic j^lantiug of other regions. The islands of the sea have 
been made so many isolated experimental stations, where men have 
learned how essential to health the forests are ; while on some of them 
the conclusive test of reforesting has been made with a return of show- 
ers, and a more equable distribution of heat and cold. Saint Jago, 
the chief of the Cape de Verde Archipelago, was, at its discovery, 
clothed with a forest which has been recklessly destroyed. Rain is 
now lacking sometimes for a whole year, a green leaf can scarcely be 
detected over what were once fertile lava plains, while certain of the 
harbors of the island have been filled up by the precious soil of the 
island, which has been carried down by the fierce torrents, which, 
alternating with drought, curse this naked island. Similar results have 
followed the destruction of forests on St. Helena, the Mauritius, and 
certain of the Canary Islands. eothe. 

ISLAND OF TERNATE. 

The effects of forests upon the general healthfulness of the State is 
great. The philosopher, Boyle, long since stated that in the Dutch 
East Indian island of Ternate, long celebrated for its beauty and 
healthfulness, the clove trees grew in such plenty as to render their 
product almost valueless. To raise the price of the commodity most 
of the spice forest was destroyed. Immediately the island — previously 
cool, healthy, and pleasant — became hot, dry, and sickly, and unfit 
for human residence. It is well known that the general clearing-away 
of the forests in this country has had a tendency to raise the tempera- 
ture in Summer. — New York Report of the Commission of State Parks. 

BUCHARIA. 

Khanate of Bucharia presents a striking example of the consequences 
brought upon a country by clearings. Within a period of thirty years 
this w'as one of the most fertile regions of Central Asia, a country 
which, when well wooded and watered, was a terrestrial paradise. But 
within the last twenty-five years a mania of clearing seized upon the 
inhabitants, and all the great forests have been cut away, while the 
little that remained was ravished by fire during the civil war. The 
consequences were not long in following, and have transformed this 
country into a kind of arid desert. The water-courses are dried up 
and the irrigating canals empty. The moving sands of the desert being 
no longer restrained by barriers of forests are every day gaining upon 
the land, and will finish by transforming into a desert as desolate as 
the solitudes that separate it from Khiva. phipps. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 21 

OHIO. 

Have you never tried to find out why Southern Ohio has ceased to 
be the gi'eat fruit country it ivas formerly known to be f Why is it that we 
can not raise any more peaclies in our State, while they used to bring 
sure crops not more than a quarter of a century ago ?***** 
What is it that makes our cHmate, once so favorable for mankind and 
vegetation, more unsteady, from year to year? Look at the woodless 
hills of Southern Ohio, and you have the answer. 

Let the hills be deprived of the rest of the protection which the 
forests afford, and half of the area of this State will be sterile in less 
than fifty years. The rain will wash the soil from the hilltops first, 
and then from the slopes ; the limestone, which is now covered with 
productive humus, loam and clay, will be laid bare ; the naked rocks 
will reflect the rays of the sun and increase the Summer heat; the 
north storms will blow unliindered over the countrj^ and every change 
of the wind will cause an abrupt change in the temperature. The 
rainfall will be diminished and become irregular. Snow and rainwater 
will at once run down in the valleys and cause periodical freshets, 
which will ultimately carry away the best part of the soil, even from 
the valleys. Such will be the unavoidable results of further devasta- 
tion of timber. rothe. 

KENTUCKY. 

Hon. CassiusM. Clay, of Kentucky, said before the American Forestry 
Cimgress at Cincinnati : "I move in the sphere of experience with more 
certainty. I remember when the forests were hardly broken here that 
springs of water were very frequent and perennial. The rivulets and 
creeks and rivers had a perpetual flow. These have now changed. The 
rivulets and creeks are now dried up in Summer, and the fish so often 
caught by me in earlier years are gone. Not, one spring in a thousand 
remains. Indian corn was generally planted in March, and the rains 
and exhalations of moisture from the surroundings made crops success- 
ful every year. Now, the destruction of the forests has lost to us that 
bed of leaves which was a perpetual reservoir of water for springs and 
evaporation; aided by the treading of the hard surface, the rain-fall, if 
the same as of old, rushes off at once, sweeping the soil into the Mis- 
sissippi delta. The dry winds absorb not only the ancient humidity of 
the air, but drink up the subsoil evaporation, so that our Winters are 
longer, more changeable, and unendurable. Corn can hardly be safely 
planted till late in April, and drouth too often ruins all in spite of 
our best efforts. 

MASSACHUSSETTS. 

Prof. Sargent, of Harvard University, who has given this question 
as much study as any one in America, says: "As moderators of the 
extremes of heat and cold, the benefits derived from extensive forests 
are undoubted, and that our climate is gradually changing through 
their destruction is apparent to the most casual observer. Our 
Springs are later, our Summers are drier, and every year becoming 
more so; our Autumns are carried forward into Winter, while our 



22 TEEES AND TEEE-PLANTING. 

Winter climate is subject to far greater changes of temperature than 
formerly. The total average of snowfall is perhaps as great as ever, 
but it is certainly less regular and covers the ground for a shorter pe- 
riod than formerly. Twenty years ago peaches were a profitable crop 
in Massachusetts ; now we must depend on New Jersey and Delaware 
for our supply; and our apples and other orchard fruits now come 
from beyond the limits of New England. The failure of these and 
other crops in the older States is generally ascribed to the exhaustion 
of the soil ; but Avith greater reason it can be referred to the destruc- 
tion of the forests which sheltered us from the cold winds of the north 
and west, and which, keeping the soil under their shade cool in Sum- 
mer and warm in Winter, acted at once as material barriers, and res- 
ervoirs of moisture." 

THE NORTHWEST. 

"I had an opportunity," says Mr. Rothe, "to observe and study 
the results caused by the destruction of the forests in the Northwest. 
Thirty years ago steamboats drawing six feet of water made regular 
trips on the Upper Mississippi up to St. Paul. Now the naviga- 
tion with boats of half that draught is uncertain. Nearly all the 
tributaries of the Upper Mississippi have also lost one-half, or even 
more, of their former supply of water. Inundations in the Spring are 
now frequent, while now in the Summer time the depth of many of 
these rivers average hardly more inches than could be measured by 
feet thirty years ago. Water-powers, which were formerly deemed 
to be inexhaustible, have entirely been abandoned, or their failing 
motive power has been replaced by steam. In the remembrance of 
the older settlers the climate of Wisconsin and Minnesota Avas remark- 
ably steady, the Winters were long and cold, the supply of snow ample 
and regular, and late frosts in the Spring were unusual. Now the 
inhabitants complain of abrupt changes of the temperature in all sea- 
sons of the year, and of the irregularity of tlie snow-fall. Tlie Legisla- 
ture of Wisconsin has already paid attention to these alarming facts, 
and has taken the preservation of existing forests, and the establish- 
ment of artificial ones, in earnest consideration. By a resolution re- 
cently passed, it asks of the National Government the transfer for 
that purpose of all unsold j)ublic lands to the State which are now 
despoiled of their timber by thievish lumbermen." 

ARIZONA. 

In the Territory of Arizona an immense number of deserted In- 
dian dwellings carved out of the rocks were recently discovered. The 
former inhabitants of the same must necessarily have been a sedative 
people, devoted to agriculture, but the v/hole district is now nearly a 
desert, there being no supply of water, and hills as well as plateaus and 
valleys are dry, stony, and nearly destitute of vegetation. This can not 
have been the condition of that district when it was densely populated 
by hundreds and thousands of Indians. Now the only plausible solu- 
tion of the ethnographical enigma which is here propounded to us, is 
the following : The hills and slopes there were once stocked with lum- 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 23 

ber, which was wasted by the inhabitants. The same deterioration of 
the country gradually took place which we notice in Palestine, Greece, 
and Scicily, where the people had to emigrate to avoid starvation. 

But enough of the warning examples of history. 

It is not too late to repair all the damage that has been done 
in America by the devastation of our natural forests. A regulation of 
the use of the timber may be effected without any injury to the legitimate 
lumber trade, and the replanting as well as the establishment of artificial 
forests, may undoubtedly be made profitable for private as well as for 
public enterprise. If it is remunerative to acclimatize and extensively 
raise American trees in Germany and France, where the soil is much 
higher in price than here, why should it not be lucrative to cultivate 
them in those parts of the United States in which the timber is scarce and 
precious? They grow quicker here and to greater perfection than any- 
wiiere else. Nature has lavishly provided this country with an un- 
commonly large number of the most valuable sj^ecies of trees. There 
are not more than thirty -five species and distinct varieties of native trees 
in France which attain a height of over thirty feet, not more than six- 
ty-five in Germany, but over one hundred and fifty in the upper part 
of the Mississippi Valley alone. All Europe possesses not a single na- 
tive walnut tree. (The so-called English walnut is of Asiatic origin.) 
We have nine varieties of hickory and two of walnut proper. You may 
search all the world over in vain to find a sort of timber which, in gen- 
eral usefulness, can rival our hickory tree. Our walnut and oak 
varieties alone outnumber all the varieties of trees native to France 
and Spain. 

A benign nature has lavishly provided for this country ; but does 
that give us a right to waste these blessings, destined for the human 
race of all future ages, within the short life of a few generations, like 
spendthrifts? Shall we adopt tlie most detestable motto of a modern 
Sardanapalus, ^^Apres nous ledelugef — anticipate every thing, and leave 
nothing for those who will come after us ? Will America's pride bear 
the humiliating prospect of having the immense work of culture, 
which so far has been achieved in this country by the most intelli- 
gent, independent, progressive, and energetic of all nations, frus- 
trated by tlie unavoidable consequences of our greedy mismanage- 
ment of the natural resources of our country ? Shall the future of this 
great republic be made uncertain by a gradual deterioration of soil 
and climate, or shall it forever remain the happy and comfortable 
home of the free? Is not the care f)r future generations one of the 
most solemn duties imposed upon us by laws of humanity and moral- 
ity. Are we worthy to enjoy the bequest of our forefathers if we are 
not just and liberal enough to i:>rovide for our descendants. 

EOTHE. 

NEVADA. 

The Nevada Enterprise in speaking of the effect that the partial 
stripping of the forests on the sides and summits of the Sierras will 
have, says: "Already one change has occurred that is evident to the 
most ordinary observer, which is the speedy melting away of the 
snow on the mountains. It now goes off at once in a flood, with the 



24 Trees and tree-planting. 

first warm weather of Spring, whereas, formerly, lying shaded and 
protected by the pines and other evergreen trees, it melted slowly, 
and all Summer sent down to the valleys on both the eastern and 
western slopes of the Sierras constant and copious streams of water. 
Instead of a good stage of water in our streams throughout Summer, 
as in former times, there is a flood in the Spi-ing, and when this is 
past by, our rivers speedily run down, and, being no longer fed from 
the mountains, evaporation leaves their beds almost dry when the hot 
weather of Summer comes on." 

FORESTS AND THEIR MANAGEMENT IN OTHER 
COUNTRIES. 

GERMANY. 

In Germany the management of forests by the state has bee» 
carried on for hundreds of years, and, as we have seen, vast tracts of 
sterile land have been redeemed by government forestry. " Here we 
find a model or precedent not only of systematically planting thous- 
ands of acres of trees, but a general system of forest management, 
commencing by a careful survey, stock-taking, and commutation of 
all rights; careful experiments in the rate of growth; the best soil for 
each description of tree; in fact, in every branch of the subject, and 
resulting in what we find to-day: hundreds of thousands of acres 
mapped, divided into periods and blocks, and worked to the best ad- 
vantage both with regard to present and future, and the annual yield 
of which now and for many years to come, is known and fixed to 
within a few hundred cubic feet. In Prussia there are twenty mill- 
ions of acres of forests, ten millions of which are state forests. Of 
these the income is $14,000,000, and the expenses $7,500,000, leaving 
$6,500,000 clear profit. When it is considered that this result is ar- 
rived at without trenching on the capital or stock of timber in the 
forests, which, on the contrary, is being increased and improved in 
every province of the kingdom, and that the indirect value to the 
people of many forest privileges, Avhich they exercise free of charge, 
must be very great, not to mention an improved climate, some idea 
may be arrived at of the enormous value and benefit such a system of 
forests must confer on Prussia. The forests form part of the 
finance department, and are presided over by an overland-forest-mas- 
ter and ministerial director, and others. There are two forest acade- 
mies, one near Berlin, and one in Hanover. There are twelve pro- 
vinces in Prussia divided into thirty circles, and to each an over-forest- 
master. Next in order come the forest-masters, numbering one hun- 
dred and eight, in charge of divisions with an average area of sixty 
thousand acres, and then the executive ofiicers, seven hundred and 
six over-foresters, to each of whom is 7,000 acres, and to each of these 
is attached a cash-keeper; and then there are 3,()46 foresters, or over- 
seers, with ranges of 1,000 to 8,000 acres. At the forest academy 
near Berlin there are seven professors with assistants. There is an 
experimental garden attached, with an over-forester in charge of the 
technical portion, and professors for the meteorological, zoological and 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 25 

chemical sections. The varied apparatus includes a building where 
seed is dried and se})arated from the cones ; large seed-bed of 
spruce, fir, willow ; full opportunities of transplanting seedlings, 
and examples of every kind of tree for botanical study. There is 
also a museum rich in specimens of all sorts of birds, animals, and in- 
sects found in the forests. In cases where the animal or insect does 
damage to trees, specimens of the branch, bark, leaf, or cone, in a 
healthy state, and after being attacked, are exhibited, close to each, 
so that the students can see at a glance the nature of the damage, and 
connect it with the animal which causes it. Insects are shown in the 
several stages of their existence— ^larvae, chrysalis, caterpillar, moth — 
with their ramifications in the stem or branches of the tree. These, 
with specimen blc^cks of almost all descriptions of timber, form a most 
instructive collection. There is a foi'est district attached. 
In the national appropriation bill, large sums are set apart for the 
purchase of such lands as are unfit for cultivation, and for utilizing^ 
the same by planting trees." phipps. 

HANOVER. 

In Hanover, a province of Prussia, there are 600,000 acres in the 
government forests, and the cost of working and all expenses, $650,- 
000 annually; the receipts, $1,500,000, and the profit $850,000. Here 
the steepest and most rocky sides of the hills are all covered with for- 
ests, which have l)een created by the labors of the Forest Department. 
In many such places, where even the few handfuls of soil placed round 
the young tree had to be carried some distance, it is not contended that 
the first plantation will yield a pecuniary profit, but the improvement 
in climate by the retention of the moisture, and the reclamation of 
large tracts, formerly barren and unproductive, is taken into account; 
besides which the dropping of leaves and needles from the trees will, 
erelong, create a soil and vegetation, and insure the success of planta- 
tions in future years. ' phipps. 

SAXONY. 

The state forests are nearly 400,000 acres, worked at an expense 
of $500,000, receiving $1,750,000, leaving to the government a clear 
rental of $1,250,000. There is a forest academy at Thorandt. The state 
forests of Bavaria are 3,000,000 acres. They return, after paying all 
expenses, $4,500,000 per annum. phipps. 

AUSTRIA. 

The state forests of Austria contain 2,000,000 acres. The forest 
academy is at Mrriabrunn, near Vienna. The collections belonging to 
the academy are fine. phipps. 

SWITZERLAND. 

In no country in Europe has the waste of forests been more rapid 
or destructive than in Switzerland, and in none, perhaps, has this im- 
providence been followed by more disastrous results. The woods, being 
considered common property, were uprooted, and the soil on the moun- 
tains, being exposed to the wash of the rains, was rapidly carried away, 
leaving broad areas of naked rock, from wliich the water would at once 



26 TREES AND TKEE-PLANTING. 

sweep down the valleys iu sudden and destructive inundations. The 
Autumn of 1868 is memorable on account of these floods. Public 
iittentiuu has, however, been thoroughly awakened, and active prepa- 
rations are iu progress to remedy the evils. The cantons which have 
charge of these operations have for some time, at great expense, been 
constructing works to control the streams and planting trees. The 
matter is now in Switzerland taken in hand by the national government. 

FRANCE. 

The forests of France, under the management of a government 
bureau, contain 7,500,000 acres. Of schools of forestry the French 
have, at Nancy, one of the best in the world, where pupils are in- 
structed both experimentally and theoretically in all forest-learning, 
the collegiate home studies being constantly varied by excursions of 
parties of students under charge of j^rofessors to those forests where, at 
the time, most can be learned. 

Italy has established a forestry school, near Florence ; Eussia, two 
forest schools — one at St. Petersburg and one near Moscow. In Sweden 
forest regulations extend as far back as 1647, and then before that 
private owners were required to plant and protect from cattle two trees 
for each one cut. phipps. 

DENMARK. 

Denmark is one of the most poorly wooded countries of Europe, 
the percentage of woodland being now only 4.25 of the whole area. 
This small proportion is caused chiefly by the nakedness of the west- 
ern part of Jutland, where the west winds have seconded the action 
of man in destroying the forests. Much of the wood, which at oue 
time covered nearly tl>e whole of Denmark, having been cut down to 
make way for agriculture, and to supply fuel and timber, a vast area 
thus bared has become a sandy, heathy desert. 

Effective measures are now taken by the Danish Government to 
preserve the remains of the woodland, and to create new planta- 
tions. The state forest department permits onl)" small portions 
of old forests to be cleared at a time, and insists on simultaneous 
planting of an equal area. The Danish forest school is at Copen- 
liagen, and forms a branch of an agricultural college. — Encydopcedia 
JBritannica. 

HOW MOISTURE IS RETAINED BY FORESTS. 

The whole forest in its natural state forms a reservoir admirably 
fltted to receive large supplies of moisture, to hold it for a lengthened 
time, and to part with it at intervals well calculated to benefit the 
vegetation of the surrounding country. The bed of the forest is a 
widely sjjread surface, piled thick with leaves, twigs, pieces of fallen 
branches, and remnants of decayed logs, covering another layer of the 
same substances in a state of partial decomposition, overlying yet 
another strata completely decomposed, — altogether forming a deep pot 
or hollow framework, penetrated with myriads of pipes, tubes, and 
aqueducts, and interspersed with millions of miniature logs, blocking 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 27 

and holding in position the flow of water, until the humus below fully 
absorbs it ; while the whole surface of the earth is crossed, recrossed, 
and crossed again by a checker-work of partially elevated roots, the 
box-like openings between which perform the same function. If we 
go below the surface, we shall find the solid earth beneath the mass of 
vegetable decomposition, pierced everywhere with upright and porous 
pillars of wonderful tubular structure — the large and perpendicular 
tap-roots which many trees possess pass deep into the solid, clayey 
strata, otherwise impermeable, and sending through the triturated 
earth which surrounds them a slow and steady supply of water to a 
thousand subterranean and spring-feeding channels, which, traveling 
away from the forests and under the cultivated fields, supply the great 
lower bed of moisture, that, continually rising, fertilizes the upper 

soil. PHIPPS. 

The protection afforded by the forest against the escape of moist- 
ure from its soil by superficial flow and evaporation insures the per- 
manence and regularity of natural spriugs, not only within the limits 
of the woods, but at some distance beyond its borders, and thus 
contributes to the supply of an element essential to both animal and 
vegetable life. As the forests are destroyed, the springs which flowed 
from the woods, and, consequently, the greater water-courses fed by 
them, diminish both in number and volume. This fact is so familiar 
in the United States and the British provinces that there are few old 
residents of the interior of those districts who are not able to testify to 
its truth as a matter of personal observation. My own recollection 
suggests to me many instances of this sort ; and I remember one case 
where a small mountain spring, which disappeared soon after the 
clearing of the ground where it rose, was recovered about twenty 
years ago by simply allowing the bushes and young trees to grow up 
on a rocky knoll, not more than half an ,acre in extent, iftimediately 
above the spring. The ground was hardly shaded before the water 
reappeared, and it has ever since continued to flow without iuterruji- 
tion. The hills of the Atlantic States formerly abounded in springs 
and brooks; but in many parts of these States, which were cleared a 
generation or two ago, the hill-pastures now suffer severely from 
drought, and in dry seasons furnish to cattle neither grass nor water. 

MARSH : " The Earth as Modified hy Man." 

EFFECTS OF THE CUTTING OF FOEESTS ON WATER 
SUPPLY OF EIVEPvS. 

Upon the territory of the commune of Labrugniere (a village of 
France) there is the forest of Moutant, containing 4,524 acres, and 
owned by the commuue. At the entrance of the forest, and along 
this brook, will be found several fulliug mills, each requiring eight- 
horse power, and moved by water-wheels which work the belters of 
the machines. The commune of Labrugniere had long been noted for 
its opposition to the forest regulations, and the cutting of wood, to- 
gether with the abuse of pasturage, had converted the forest into an 
immense waste, so that this great property would hardly pay cost of 



28 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

guarding it, and afford a meager supply of wood for its inliabitante. 
While the forest was thus ruined and the soil denuded, the waters 
after each heavy rain swept down through the valley, bringing with 
them great quantities of gravel, the debris of which still encumber the 
channel of the stream. The violence of these floods was sometimes 
so great that they were compelled to stop the machines for some time. 
But in the Summer-time another inconvenience made its appearance. 
Little by little the drought extended, the flow of waters became in- 
significant, the mills stood idle, or could run only occasionally for a 
short time. 

About 1840 the municipal authorities began to inform their pop- 
ulation relative to their true interests, and under the protection of 
better supervision the work of replanting has been well managed, and 
the forest is to-day in successful growth. In proportion as the re-plant- 
ing progressed, the precarious use of the mills ceased, and the regu- 
lation of the water-courses was totally modified. They now no longer 
swell into sudden and violent floods, compelling the machines to stop; 
but the rise did not begin until six or eight hours after the rains 
began, they rose steadily to their maximum, and then subsided in the 
same manner. In short, they were no longer obliged to stop work, and 
the waters were always enough to run two machines and sometimes 
three. This example is remarkable in this, that all the other circum- 
stances had remained the same, and therefore, we could only attrib- 
ute to the reforesting the changes that occurred, namely, diminution 
of the flood at the time of rain and an increase in its flow during 
common times. 

M. CANTEGEIL, sub-i nspector of forests, in Ami des Sciences. 

THE RAIN AND FORESTS. 

There is nothing of greater importance to the agriculturist than 
rain at the proper season and in proper quantity ; and science has 
demonstrated that the forests of a country are potent in the regula- 
tion of storms, the formation of clouds, and the descent of rain. 
Any thing which vitally affects the interests of the farmer and producer 
affects the whole State, and demands the earliest attention of the peo- 
ple's representatives. — New York Meport of the Commissioners of Stat* 
Paries. ' 

FLOODS. 

The reckless destruction of forests, so strongly condemned by 
many American writers, which has been practiced by their country- 
men, is now bearing its fruits in the terrible Spring and Autumn 
floods which of late years have affected large portions of the United 
States. The Americans might spare much of their care for the 
channels of the Mississippi if they would restore the groves cut from 
the hills which feed its sources. To disforest a mountain slope is to 
devote the height to barrenness, the valley to flood, and both to parch- 
ing drought when drought is most injurious. phipps. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 29 

Wherevlr the forests have (lisaj^peared, the Spring inuudatious 
of the rivers have acquii'ed a frequency uukuovvu before. It can not 
be disputed that the terrible destructive effects of the inundations of 
the Loire and the Vistula, of late years, must be in great part at- 
tributed to the excessive denudation of the forests. 

SCHACHT, Professor at the Universili/ of Bon, " Les Arbres." 

IMMENSE AMOUNT OF WATER GIVEN TO THE ATMOS- 
PHERE BY TREES. 

The amount of moisture given out by trees is immense. In some 
trees the upward rush of moisture from the roots is very powerful. 
The workmen in ship-yards frequently find in the center of a teak log 
a core of sand fifty or sixty feet long, an inch in diameter, and har- 
dened to a marble-like consistency, which has been carried and de- 
posited there by the sap in its upward course. 

WASHINGTON ELM. 

A few years ago a number of scientists of New England made a 
calculation as to the amount of water given to the atmosphere by the 
"Washington Elm," Cambridge, Mass. They calculated that the 
leaves of that tree would cover over 200,000 square feet of surface, 
and that they gave out every fair day during the growing season 
15,500 lbs., or tf tons, of moisture. ' J. B. P. 

HEALTHFULNESS OF FORESTS. 

The influence of forests on the healthfulness of the atmosphere 
demands thoughtful attention. Plants imbibe from the air carbonic 
acid, and other gaseous and volatile products, exhaled by animals or 
developed by the natural phenomena of decomposition. These the 
trees, more than the smaller plants, absorb, and instead of them pour 
into the atmosphere pure oxygen, essential to the life of animals. The 
carbon, the very substance of wood, is taken from the carbonic acid tluis 
absorbed. "Humid air," says Bequerel, "charged with miasmata, is 
deprived of them in passing through the forest." R, w, emerson, 

A MOUNTAIN cliff, a wall, or a forest, are the natural protection 
against the wind. In this respect the forest can not be without 
beneficial effect on the adjacent country; the young growth of trees 
flourishes, screened from the force of the wind, the arable land de- 
velops itself better, sands meet an impassable barrier, and the noxious 
influence of the dry winds is turned aside. It is, then, indisputable 
that the forests exercise a salutary influence on the temperature of a 
country. The sanitary condition of man and the domestic animals, 
as well as the growth of cultivated plants, depends on the climate 
of the locality. The fertility of a country depends on its su])ply of 
forest land ; for on this depend the foundation of soil, the precipitation 
of dew, the fall of rain, the steady current of rivers, the mitigation 
of the evil influences of unhealthy winds, and the growth of vege- 
tables in the fields and meadows. schacht. 



30 trp:es and tree-planting. 

To ARREST a pestilence by quarantine, the State sternly interrup<^s 
trade, travel, and pleasure ; but the far greater mortality from the in- 
creasing fickleness and cruelty of our climate can be arrested by the 
gentlest means. It is needed only that our broad States shall have 
one-fourth or one-fifth of their surface covered with trees — which, by 
the way, may be so distributed as to increase the value and producing 
power of lauds. It is needed only that the road sides shall be well 
planted, that all hills shall be fixed forever with woods, that the riv- 
ers shall be fringed with appropriate species, and that woods shall be 
wood, in fact, and not struggling collections of the dying monarchs of 
the primeval forest. Along with a better climate will come not only 
the better health and longer lives, but forgotten springs will gush 
anew from the hills, the attenuated streams will fill their banks again — 
and yield us a better fish supply — and will cease to drown the val- 
leys with floods after every rain. daniel millikin. 

MECHANISM OF A TREE. 

A tree (and I beg my readers to follow this attempt at ex- 
planation closely — all depends upon it) receives its nourishment from 
the roots. These correspond to the mouth in the human frame. Now, 
as in the human frame the nourishment received is, after being sup- 
plied to the blood, exposed to the operaticm of air in the lungs before 
it is fit to give material to the body, so in a tree, the nourishment 
taken in at these tree mouths, the roots, passes to the lungs of the 
tree, and there, by contact with the air, is rendered fit to supply fresh 
material to the tree. These tree lungs are the leaves. This opera- 
tion is affected by the passage upward from the soil around the roots, 
through the trunk, the branches, and every twig of the tree to the 
leaves, of a large quantity of water, containing in solution the nutri- 
ment for the tree. Arrived at the leaves, a process takes place which 
separates, by means of contact with the air, most of the water the 
roots had taken in, from the valuable nutriment, and throws off, in 
vapor, the surplus water into the air. At this time certain constitu- 
ent portions of the air are utilized and mingled with the nourishment 
retained. This is all, now a small portion in comparison with what 
had arisen from the roots, j'et retaining enough water to serve as 
as a vehicle back, is returned toward the roots, depositing in its way, 
in leaf, bark, and root, what is needed there for the growth of the 
tree. In these, they undergo, especially in the bark, further fitting 
and digesting processes before they assimilate with the substance of 
the tree. The water which was retained to carry them down, being 
no longer needed, passes out at the roots. ... In the back of 
the leaf are numerous stomates or mouths. . . . Of the extent 
of the provision made for evaporation by the leaves, some idea may 
be formed from a consideration of the number ofstomata or stomates to 
be found in the leaves of plants. The number vai'ies in different 
plants, for which variation a reason may be found in the different con- 
ditions of growth to which they are subjected in their several natural 
habitats. In the back of the leaf of the apple tree there are about 
twenty-four thousand stomates to the square inch. In the leaf of the 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 31 

lilac there are a hundred and sixty thousand of them to the square 
inch. In the leaves of the cherry-laurel there are none on the upper 
surface of the leaf, but ninety thousand have been counted on the 
lower surface. phipps. 

PROPORTIONATE AREA OF WOODLAND. 

Men need to be taught to plant trees, and their children to plant 
and love them. Owners of good lands in Maine or elsewhere will in 
the future learn that their bleak fields, if judiciously planted with wood 
to the extent of 40 per cent of area, will produce on the remaining 
60 per cent more in all kinds of crops than the whole does now or 
can be made to do under any other possible course of treatment. 
Lands well sheltered can and do produce Wintei* wheat in Maine as 
well as on the new lands at the West. In accordance with this me- 
morial, the State Legislature provided for exemption for twenty years 
from taxation of all cleared land on which forest trees had been suc- 
cessfully cultivated for three years, and maintained in a thriving con- 
dition thereafter. — Committee on Agriculture. 

What portion of the area of the State should be covered with 
forests ? Economists estimate about twenty-five per cent as a suitable 
proporti(m ; but this varies with the position, physical character, and 
commercial iuterests of the country under consideration. " I do not 
pretend that the whole of our farms should be planted in forests trees," 
says Hon. H. G. Joly, of Quebec; "that would be absurd. Our 
farms ai'e generally too large for the small number of hands we employ; 
there are always some odd corners, idle strips, stony or damp patches 
winch it does not pay to cultivate. Begin and plant forest tree? there, 
suiting the tree to the nature of the soil — you will find some for every 
kind of soil. Once planted and fairly started, they will take care of 
themselves, give no trouble, and increase yearly in value. If every 
acre of ground were covered with valuable crops, one would try and 
get reconciled to the absence of trees, and bow to tlie iron rule of our 
age which converts every thing into cash. But what a small propor- 
tion of all that ground is used profitably! We can find plenty of spare 
room for growing forest trees ; they are not only the most beautiful 
ornaments to a country, and the most useful product of nature, giving 
fuel, timber, shade, shelter, retaining moisture, and a protection against 
droughts, etc., etc., but, considering the question from a strictly money- 
making point of view, the culture of forest trees is perhaps the best and 
safest investment that can be made." 

NOTES. 

ROADSIDE TREES. 

In Germany, France, Italy, and many other countries of Europe, 
as has been seen, large forests are planted annually under the direct 
supervision of the several governments; but besides these and private 
forests, trees are planted in great numbers by the roadsides. At pres- 
ent the total length of public roads of France is 18,750 miles, of 



32 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

which 7,250 miles are bordered with trees, while 4,500 miles are at 
present being planted or will shortly be planted. On the remaining 
7,000 miles the nature of the soil does not admit of tree growth. 
The number of trees already planted by the roadsides in France 
amounts to 2,878,603, consisting principally of elm, poplar, acacia, 
ash, plane, sycamore, and limes. In Germany many thousands of 
miles of roads are shaded by trees ; in some parts they are forest trees, 
in others fruit trees. 1 regret that I have n't the exact statistics. 

All lovers.of trees should hold in grateful remembrance the name 
of Hon. James Hillhouse, of New Haven, Connecticut, who beauti- 
fied that city by planting with his own hand the elms that have since 
made it famous. 

" I nAVE always admired," says Whittier, " the good taste of the 
Sokoki Indians around Sabago Lake, who, when their chief died, dug 
around a beech-tree, swaying it down, and placed his body in the rent, 
and then let the noble tree fall back into its original place, a green 
and beautiful monument for a son of the forest." 

"Planting and pruning trees," Sir Walter said, "I could work 
at from morning till night. There is a sort of self-congratulation, a 
little tickling self-flattery in the idea that while you are pleasing and 
amusing yourself you are seriously contributing to the future wel- 
fare of the country." 

FAMOUS TREES. 

A few famous trees of this country, not named in the extract from the 
letter of the historian Lossiug, are given here. The "Burgoyne elm," 
at Albany, N. Y. — This tree was planted on the day the British gen- 
eral, Burgoyne, was brouglit a prisoner into Albany, the day after the 
surrender. The weeping-willow in Copp'sburying-ground, near Bunker 
Hill — This willow, grown from a branch taken from the tree that shaded 
tlie grave of Napoleon at St. Helena, now waves over that of Cotton 
Mather, so noted in Salem witchcraft. Copp'sburying-ground is so near 
where the battle was fought that a number of grave-stones can be seen 
to-day which were pierced through by bullets fired by British soldiers 
in that battle. The ash-trees planted by General Washington at Mt. 
Vernon — These ashes form a beautiful row of immense trees, which 
are the admiration of all who visit the home of the " Father of hia 
Country." . j. b. p. 

THE GARY TREE — PLANTED BY ALICE AND PHCEBE CARY. 

In 1832, when Alice was twelve years old, and Phoebe only eight, 
as these little girls were returning home from school one day, they 
found a small tree, which a farmer had grubbed up and thrown into 
tlie road. One of them picked it up, and said to the other, " Let us 
plant it." As soon as said, these happy children ran to the opposite side 
of the road, and with sticks — for they had no other implement — they 
dug out the earth, and in the hole thus made they placed the treelet; 
around it, with their tiny hands, they drew the loosened mold, and 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 33 

pressed it down with their httle feet. AVith what interest tliey hastened 
to it on their way to and from school, to see if" it were growing; and how 
they clapped their httle hands for joy when they saw the buds start 
and the leaves begin to form ! With wluit delight did they watch it 
grow through the sunny days of Summer! With what anxiety did 
they await its fate through the storms of Winter, and when at last 
the long-looked for Spring came, with what feelings of mingled hope 
and fear did they seek again their favorite tree ! 

But I must not pursue the subject further. It is enough to know 
that when these two sisters had grown to womauh')od, and removed to 
New York City, they never returned to their old home without pay- 
ing a visit to the tree that they had planted, and that was scarcely 
less dear to them than the friends of their childhood days. They 
planted and cared f )r it in youth ; they loved it in age. That tree is 
the large and beautiful sycamore which one sees in passing along the 
Hamilton turnpike from College Hill to Mt. Pleasant, Hamilton 
County, Ohio. j. b. p. 

" OLD LIBERTY ELM." 

It was the custom of our New England ancestors to plant trees 
in the early settlement of our country, and dedicate them to liberty. 
Many of these "liberty trees," consecrated by our forefathers, are stiU 
standing. I remember, when a boy, the interest I felt in "Old Lib- 
erty Elm," that then stood in Boston. That old tree was planted by 
a schoolmaster long before the Revolutionary War, and dedicated by 
him to the independence of the Colonies. Around that tree, before 
the Revolution, the citizens of Boston used to gather to listen to the 
advocates of our country's freedom; around it, during the war, they 
met to offer up thanks and supplications to Almighty God for the 
success of the patriot armies; and, after the terrible struggle had 
euded, the people were wont to assemble from year to year in the 
shadow of that old tree to celebrate the liberty and independence of 
our country. It stood there till within a few years, a living monu- 
ment of the patriotism of the citizens of Boston. The sight of that 
tree awakened patriotic emotions in every true American Heart. 
And when at last that old tree fell, the bells in all the churches of 
Boston were tolled, and a feeling of sadness spread over city and 
State. Even in Ohio, there were eyes that moistened with tears when, 
the news came that " Old Liberty Elm" had fallen in a storm. Such 
was the veneration in which it was held. j. b. p. 

"WASHINGTON ELM." 

Another of these "liberty elms" now stands in Cambridge, Mass. 
Under the shade of this venerable tree Washington first took com- 
mand of the Continental army, July 3, 1775. How the affection of 
every lover of his country clings around that tree! What care has 
been taken of it, what marks of esteem have been shown it by the 
citizens of Cambridge, may be judged by those who have seen it 
standing, as it does, in the center of a great public thoroughfare, its 
trunk protected by an iron fence from injury by passing vehicles, 
which for more than a century have turned out in deference to this 
monarch of tlie Revolution. j. b. p. 

3 



34 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

ARBOR DAY. 

Teachers can easily interest their pupils in adorning the school 
grounds. With proper prearraugenient as to the selection and pro- 
curing of trees, vines, or shrubs, Arbor Day may accomplish wonders. 
Many hands will make merry, as well as light, the work. Such a 
holiday will be an attractive occasion of social enjoyment and im- 
provement. The parents should be persuaded to approve and patron- 
ize the plan. It tends to fraternize the people of a district, when 
they thus meet on common ground, and young and old work together 
for a common object, where all differences of rank, or sect, or party, 
are forgotten. The plantings and improvements thus made will be 
sure to be protected. They will remain as silent, but effective teach- 
ers of the beautiful to all the pupils, gradually improving their taste 
and character. Such work done around the school naturally extends 
to the homes. You improve the homes by improving the schools as 
truly as you improve the schools by improving the homes. "The 
hope of America is the homes of America." It has long been my 
ambition to improve the homes and home-life of our industrial classes 
and help them to realize that the highest privilege and central duty of 
life is the creation of happy homes, for the home is the chief school of 
virtue, the fountain-head of individual and national strength and pros- 
perity. It is a worthy ambition to surround one's home and children 
with such scenes and influences as shall make the every-day life and 
labors brighter and happier, and help one to go sunny and singing to his 
work. Our youth should early share in such efforts for adorning the 
surroundings of their homes, and planting trees by the wayside. How 
attractive our roads may become by long avenues of trees. This is 
beautifully illustrated in many countries of Europe. 

Arbor Day will become one of the institutions of the country, in 
which our boys and girls will take an eager share and genuine pleas- 
ure, and thus gain a liking for trees that will never be effaced. Ne- 
braska has the honor of originating Arbor Day. Some ten years ago, 
at the request of its State Board of Agriculture, the governor ap- 
pointed the second Wednesday in April as the day to be devoted to 
economic tree-planting, and it is claimed that twelve millions of trees 
were planted on that day. The successive governors have continued 
thus to recognize this day. The schools last Spring adopted the "Cin- 
cinnati plan" of planting "memorial trees." 

The recent Spring floods and Summer droughts in Indiana, Ohio, 
and elsewhere, increasingly and now alarmingly destructive, are call- 
ing public attention to the cause and remedy as never before. The 
denudation of the hills and mountain sources of the_ springs is the 
leading cause of these freshets, and these can be remedied only by the 
extensive re-foresting of such lands. This great result, which must 
be the work of time, will be best accomplished by interesting the 
young, as well as the old, in tree-planting. The Arbor Day in schools 
will do immense good in this direction. We need to popularize and 
diffuse the sentiment of trees. This will best secure their propagation 
and protection. The frequency of forest fires is the common objection 
to economic tree-planting. But let the sentiment of trees be duly 



ARBOIl DAY EXERCISES. oO 

cultivated, and they will be regarded as our friends, as is the case iu 
Germany. The public need to understand that the interests of all 
classes are concerned in the conservation of forests, In Germany, 
Switzerland, Sweden, and other European countries, this subject is so 
taught iu their schools that the people generally appreciate the value 
of trees and the need of protecting them. Hence au enlightened public 
seutimeut is a better guardian of their forests thau the national police. 

HON. B. G. NORTHROP. 

It is vital to the future welfare of our people that the repro- 
duction of the forests should at once begin, not ou a small scale or in 
few localities, but in large measures and co-extensive with our settle- 
ments. A broad statesmanship, in our national and State Legislature, 
should at once take up the subject, and deal with it year by year until 
the great work shall be adquately begun. 

There can be no doubt of the beneficial influence of the forest 
areas equal in aggregate to one-fourth or one-third of the entire area 
of any extensive region. But however important climate effects may 
be in this connection — however desirable it may be that the crops and 
animal life of the farm should enjoy the benefits of forest influences 
and shelter, the need of extensive forest planting is important enough 
without taking into consideration its eflfect on atmospheric movements, 
temperature,' and rainfall. The store, the dwelling, the shop, the 
factory, the railroad, the wharf, the warehouse — all these demand 
action ; demand it in the name of domestic life, of farm economy, of 
commerce, of all the arts of our civilization. What we shall save in 
climate by preserving forest areas, or gain by their extension, is just 
so much to be enjoyed iu addition to other compensations. 

DR. JOHN A. WARDER. 

DESTRUCTION OF FORESTS IN OHIO. 

Ohio was once supposed to possess an unfailing supply of black 
walnut, but it has been shipped into other States and to foreign coun- 
tries iu such vast quantities that there is now scarcely a first-class tree , 
of this kind to be found in her bounds. Much of it has been shipped 
to Austria. Since 1850 Ohio has suffered the destruction of a vast 
proportion of her forest area. Between the years 1853 and 1870 there 
were cleared over four million two hundred thousand acres — equal to 
one-sixth of the entire area of the State, and equivalent to the removal 
of the timber from au entire county each year. In his last message 
to the Ohio Legislature, Governor Bishop stated that during the years 
between 1870 and 1878 over four million five hundred thousand acres 
of timbered land had been cleared, which was nearly one-half the en- 
tire acreage of 1870. To restore the forests of the state to the condi- 
tion of fifty years ago would require not less than two hundred years. 
Consequent upon the destruction of the forests many rivers have be- 
come diminished, among which Bryant named the Cuyahoga ; and 
from the same cause — the destruction of our forests — other streams 
are drying up in Summer. 

DAVID D. THOMPSON. 



36 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 



HOW TO PLANT TREES. 

The followiug articles are takeu from the writings of experienced 
tree-planters : 

SOME THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS ON TREE-PLANTING. 

One of the first and most important considerations is the adapta- 
tion of the kind of tree to the soil which is to become its new home. 
It would be useless to plant a weeping willow or a swamp cypress on 
a liigh, dry, and stony hill. None of the genera which naturally 
select elevated and dry localities should be planted in low and swampy 
grounds. The constituents of the soil may vary greatly, but the con- 
stant supply of moisture in the new h)cality should vary but little 
from that in which the tree to be transplanted originally grew. 

Any kind of tree whose stump sprouts freely after its trunk has 
been cut away will grow readily after transpUiuting, if the work has 
been properly done at the riglit time. The stump of the pine tree, 
and indeed of many of the. couiferse, rarely sprouts. Every one who 
has tried it, and has succeeded knows what a triumph it is to nurse 
into vigorous life and growth a pine tree or a hemlock tree after trans- 
planting it. 

The best time to plant trees is in the Spring before the buds have 
begun to swell. The top and branches should be well cut back. If 
this be done in the Fall, previous to transplanting, so much the better, 
as it saves the tree much vital force. 

To insure the growth of a tree, it should be removed with the 
greatest of care, so as to keep intact as many of the rootlets and their 
terminal spongioles as possible. The sooner a tree be planted after its 
removal the better are its chances for growing. Within certain limits 
the smaller tlie.tree and the larger the root the surer is it to grow. 

The place a tree is to be set should be thoroughly prepared by spad- 
ing up the soil to the depth of two feet or more ;* then filling up with 
loose, rich soil to the proper height. The tree may now be set into the 
2)lace prepared for it. The surface of the fine soil upon which you set 
the tree should be adapted to the inequality of the roots, so that the 
tree will stand erect and alone. While the fine soil is being sifted upon 
the roots, the tree should be churned up and down with a gentle mo- 
tion, so there be left no empty space under and around the roots. A 
pail of water should now be poured on the soil about the roots (this 
should be done with watering can or sprinkler), so as to insure their 
close embrace and to affi)rd some food for the fasting tree. 

The soil should not he heaped up around the tree, but pressed down, 
but not too firndy, to the level of the surrounding surface. 

The ash, the oak, the chestnut, the hickory, the walnut (black 
and white), the maple, and the tulip all respond readily to the above 
treatment. A. D. binkerd, m. d. 



*NoTE.— In sandy soil or in drained ground this will do, but in clayey 
soil the hole must not be dug too deep, as it forms a reservoir of water 
which will often kill the tree. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 37 



TRANSPLANTING TREES. 



Nearly every one who lives in the country at some time plants 
trees, but how few know just how to do it properly! 

At the outset it is necessary to bear in miud that the tree is a 
living body, and that the process of removal interferes with its fuuc- 
tions, and when it is displaced from the ground, causing an arrest of 
the circulation that is constantly going on between the tree and the 
soil, a severe shock is sustained. Every root-fiber destroyed lessens 
by so much the chances of success, and when a greater portion (if 
these are gone, the tree is forced to depend on its own vitality to sup- 
ply a new set of rootlets before growth can take place. 

In the beginning bear in mind that it is important not to injure the 
roots and to preserve as many as possible, particularly the small ones, 
for these are what must be depended on to start the growth in the new- 
life. Where trees are dug up to be removed a short distance, preserve 
all the roots if possible. 

When the tree is out of the ground, exposure to the sun or drying 
winds will cause evaporation, which is veiy detrimental to the tree, and 
is a common cause of failure, and one which is often overlooked. If, 
however, the tree has become shriveled and dried, vitality may often 
be restored by burying the whole tree for a few days in moist soil ; but 
it is far better not to have them get in condition to need any such rem- 
edy, which at best can not restore the tree to its original condition. 

In excavating holes for planting, it is not necessary to dig very 
deep, unless for a tree with a tap-root; it may even be hurtful in a 
hard soil by affording a place to hold water under a tree to its injury. 
The roots of young trees grow near the surface, and the holes should 
be large enough to allow the roots to be extended their full length with- 
out cramping or bending. 

In case it is very dry at the time of plaiiting, it is a good plan to 
puddle the soil arouud the l-oots, always covering with dry earth. In 
this way moisture will be retained for a long time. Avoid too deep 
planting. . The roots must not be placed beyond the action of the air ; 
about the depth they were in before removed, or a very little deeper. 
When filling, press the earth from the first firmly, so as to leave no 
spaces, and have it compact about the roots. This latter point can 
not be too thoroughly attended to, and, of course, to do this well, the 
soil must be finely pulverized and no lumps be allowed in the filling. 
It will be necessary to use the hand to place the soil in spaces where 
the spade can not go. 

The time of setting is best when the soil has settled in the Spring 
and become Avarm, so that trees not being removed begin to start. 
Earlier than this is not so well, f )r the sooner the tree begins to grow 
after being set the more likely to do well. We believe the proper time 
is the Spring, the best time for planting all kinds of trees, althougli 
early Fall ])lantiiig is often recommended. Evergreens often succeed 
well planted in August; still we would rather risk them in the Spring, 
just as they are ready to grow. When you would plant early potatoes 
is a good time to plant trees. Evergreens are the most sensitive of any 
to drying while being removed, and if once allowed to become dry it is 



38 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

all-day with them; no amount of pains or trouble can restore the lost 
vitality. For this reason they can be removed but short distances 
unless very carefully packed. 

As more or less of the roots are removed or injured, it is neces- 
sary to prune the top when transplanted. This has generally been- 
done by cutting all the branches back ; but a better way is to remove 
a portion of the branches, leaving those strong ones that are in posi- 
tion to give the tree a well-shaped top. If all the branches are left, 
and the proportion between the tops and roots balanced by cutting all 
back, in after-growth some of these branches will require to be re- 
moved — an injury, perhaps, to the tree. This certainly will apply to 
fruit-trees. Sometimes trees for ornament or shade require to be cut 
back to make a thicker top or one more symmetrical. Large trees 
are removed in Winter with a large ball of earth attached to the 
root, and, though a heavy job, it is the only successful method of 
doing it. A trench can be dug at the proper distance around the 
tree, and filled with coarse litter previous to freezing, and also the 
holes to receive the trees, which will much facilitate the labor. 

Small trees do better than large ones, and it is better to be to the 
trouble of taking care of them one or two years longer than to have 
them grow too long in the nursery row. Trees grown on good soil 
are better than from poor soil. They have more and better roots, 
and are in better condition to grow in their new location. Of course, 
it is not desirable that the soil where they have grown should be so 
rich as to produce such a growth that the wood will not properly 
ripen, but sufficient to make a strong, healthy tree. A tree in poor 
soil has weak, spindling, feeble branches, and, like a starved animal, 
takes a long time to recover, even when placed in better soil with 
better feeding. 

After large trees are properly transplanted they should be staked, to 
prevent swayiug around by the wind. When the ground is soft the 
movement of the top creates a displacement of the roots before they 
have taken any hold of the soil, resulting in injury or death to the 
tree. Mulching must not be dispensed with. Its object is to keep the 
soil moist until tlie roots obtain a strong hold. This may be overdone. 
Mulch for shade only. A large mass of decaying matter is more hurt- 
ful than beneficial. We can not avoid all risks in transplanting; but 
if these conditions, which we repeat, are followed, the risk will be 
very much lessened : Careful removal, protection from drying wliile 
out of the ground, setting in warm, well-pulverized soil, hard tramp- 
ing the soil about the roots, judicious pruning, staking, and mulching. 

All this requires care and labor; but it will make the clittercnce 
between a thrifty, profitable orchard and a sickly and unpn)fitablo 
one, or a fine-fi)rmed, well-grown shade or ornamental tree and a 
stunted, unhealthy specimen which has no beauty or gives no pleas- 
ure. — X. 

If the trees are large, cut the top well back. The elm will grow 
if cut back to a pole ; but if left with a full top the chances are that 
the tree will die, wholly or partially, leaving the living portion in un- 
satisfactory shape. A most common mistake is that of leaving too 



ARBOK DAY EXERCISES. 39 

much top. In case of the maple tree, however, the top should be 
lessened by thinning the branches, leaving the outline of the tree not 
much disturbed. This is necessary to secure the symmetrical oval 
shape which is the beauty of the maple. If great care be taken to 
secure all the roots, and as much earth as possible, a larger top than 
otherwise will be supported. If the tree stand upon a slope, take a 
spade and cut a narrow, leading channel in the turf, which will con- 
duct more water to the roots of the tree, in case of a washing shower, 
than it would receive without this help. 

PLANTING FORESTS. 

The foregoing directions are for planting large trees for shade or 
•ornament; the following are for planting forests for revenue: 

To start forests of oak, hickory, walnut, and aU other heavy-seeded 
trees, it is best and cheapest to plant the seeds just where the trees 
are to grow. One method of planting acorns and nuts, in practice by 
the Tharandt Forest Academy, of Saxony, is as follows: Take a stick 
sharpened at one end and shove it obliquely into the earth to the 
depth of two inches, not more (in hard or stony ground, the pick is 
used), put in the seed and press the soil above it down firmly with the 
foot. The seeds should be placed about three feet apart. For the 
catalpa, elm, maple, locust, evergreen, and all other hght-seeded trees, 
it is best to plant the seed in beds, and transplant them three feet apart 
after one, two, or three years' growth. 

These little trees can be planted very rapidly with a hoe or spade. 
Dig a small hole a little deeper than the roots; hold the plant verti- 
cally with the left hand, and with the right draw the soil carefully 
iiround the roots, and press it down with the hands and foot. If there 
iire stones near by, place a few around the plant ; they will help keep 
the surface moist, and prevent the weeds and grass from growing. In 
prairie lands, or Avhere there is tough sod, the ground should be culti- 
vated for three years, and then prepared as for wheat, and furrows 
may be run three feet apart, the seedlings laid in these furrows, and 
their r(x>ts covered with a plow. They need no other attention except 
to keep them free of weeds and to thin when necessary. For a full 
discussion of the subject of tree-planting and forest culture see Dr. 
F. B. Hough's report to our gtvernment for 1877. This exceedingly 
valuable book is, we believe, now out of print, but copies might be 
obtained from members of Congress of 1878-80. 

FOREST CULTURE. 

North of the Potomac, and east of the Ohio, and I presume in 
limited districts elsewhere, rocky, sterile wood-lands, costing from two 
dollars to fifty dollars per acre, according to locality, etc., are to-day 
the cheapest property to be bought in the United States, even though 
nothing were done with them but to keep out fire and cattle, and let 
the young trees grow as they will. Money can be more profitably 
and safely invested in lauds covered by young timber than any thing 
else. The parent who would invest a few thousand for the bene- 



40 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

fit of his children or grandchildren, while young, may buy wood- 
lands which will be worth twenty times their present cost within the 
next twenty years. But better even than this would it be to buy up 
rocky, craggy, naked hill-sides, and eminences which have been past- 
ured to death, and shutting out the cattle inflexibly, scratch these 
over with plow, mattock, hoe', or pick, as circumstances shall dictate; 
plant them thickly with chestnut, walnut, hickory, white oak, and the 
seeds of locust and white pine. Plant thickly and of divers kinds, so 
as to cover the ground promptly and choke out weeds aud shrubs, 
with full purpose to thin and prune as circumstances shall dictate. 
Many farmers are averse to planting timber because they think nothing 
can be realized therefrom for the next twenty or thirty years, which 
is as long as they expect to live. But this is a grave miscalculation. 
Let us suppose a rocky, hilly pasture lot of ten or twenty acres, rudely 
scratched over as I have suggested, and thickly seeded with hickory 
nuts and white oak acorns only. Within five years it will yield 
abundantly of hoop-poles, though the better, more promising half be 
left to mature, as they should be ; two years later another and larger 
crop of hoop-poles may be cut, still sparing the best, and thenceforth 
a valuable crop of timber may be taken from the land; for if cut at 
the proper season (October to March), at least two thrifty sprouts 
will start from every stump; and so that wood will yield a clear in- 
come each year, while the best trees are steadily growing and matur- 
ing. I do not advise restriction to those two species of timber, but I 
insist that a young plantation of forest trees may and should yield a 
clear income in every year after its fourth. Horace greeley. 

PROFITS OF FOREST CULTURE. 

Many millions of dollars of American capital are invested in va- 
rious enterprises which require a much longer time to yield profit or 
income and never pay nearly as well as systematic forest culture in 
the proper locality. Great fortunes are risked in wild speculations, 
in rail-roads which pay no dividends, in mining stocks wliich enrich 
only the agents, or brokers selling them, in lands and lots, which never 
attain the expected increase of value. But there is certainly no risk 
in forest culture. It produces an article of general and steadily in- 
creasing demand, and it can be calculated with almost mathematical 
certainty what profit may be derived from it and within what time. 

The fiict that it is highly remunerative in all Europe, where land 
is much higher in price than here, should justify the expectation that 
it will be profitable here. Our soil and climate produce a much larger 
variety of valuable timber than any European country. Several 
species of American trees are now cultivated there very extensively be- 
cause of the superior qualities of the same and witli a view to large 
profit therefrom. Our American hickory, black walnut, hard maple, 
and wild cherry for instance have none of their equals in Europe. 
They excite the envy of European carriage makers, furniture men, and 
manufacturers of tools. They are now largely imported from Amer- 
ica, but the forest-men of Germany and France are earnestly engaged 
in raising them for the home market. Now it is well known that on this 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 41 

continent forest trees grow much quicker aud comparatively taller 
than in the eastern hemisphere. Here ttie most useful trees attain 
their full development in two-thirds of the time required in Europe, 
an advantage which can hardly be overestimated. 

In the United States the consumption of timber per capita of the 
population is infinitely larger than in Europe, where no frame houses 
are built, where no new settlements are made, and where only a very 
small minority of the people are so situated that they may indulge in 
the luxury of fine furniture, buggies, and carriages. The parlor and sit- 
ting room furniture of any of our skilled mechanics, or small shop-keepers, 
made up from black walnut, cherry, or ash, would amply do for many 
a European officer of more than ordinary rank. In the rural districts 
of Spain, Italy, France, aud Germany, hardly one out of a hundred 
persons is able to buy furniture of what we would call the most com- 
mon kind. Here in America, the proportion of the use of timber for 
furniture and carriage work to its production has become really alarm- 
ing. Within the past twenty-five years, the price of such timber has 
risen at a rapid rate aud is still increasing. At any place not too dis- 
tant from the ordinary transportation lines, every year's growth of a 
walnut, maple, or hickory tree represents a sure and respectable in- 
crease of the owner's capital. 

The governments of Prussia, of several of the smaller German 
principalities, and of France, Austria, and Italy make forest-culture 
an unfailing source of a large yearly revenue. They find it profitable 
to buy tracts of inferior lands at prices equal to those of our best 
farming lands, and to stock them with timber. Many private land- 
owners there also derive a large yearly income from their forests with- 
out ever diminishing the area of the same; Forests there are divided 
in enough equal parcels for yearly cutting to give the trees sufficient 
tirae for development, and each parcel is immediately replanted after 
having been cleared. Excepting a few remote mountain districts, 
there are no more natural forests in Central Europe. It is not profi- 
table to let any forest tree remain growing after it has attained full 
age, as the forester calls it. In Central Europe oak grows to perfection 
in eighty to one hundred and twenty, beach and pine in thirty to fifty 
years. But it is not always intended to raise trees to full size, and 
it is really not so remunerative. 

Only the better class of wheat or meadow-land nets a greater aver- 
age revenue in twenty-five years than well-managed forests — a fact 
which may at first sight seem incredible, but which is easily accounted 
for by comparison between the yearly expenses of grain culture and 
the trifling outlay required for the planting and maintenance of a for- 
est after the trees have become two or three years old, and by taking 
in consideration the frequent failures of grain crops and the sure stead- 
iness of the growth of trees. Planting may be d(me by children. 

With all the advantages in our favor, why should forest-culture not 
be just as profitable in Ohio as in any part of Europe? Our supply of 
timber, fit for furniture, carriages, and even cooperage is almost en- 
tirely exhausted. The many timber lots distributed all over the state 
are very deceptive. Closer inspection will show that nearly all the 
good trees of larger size have long ago found their way to the saw- 



42 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

mills, aud that only the wind-twisted and heart-rotten ones have 
remained. Spontaneous growth is not regular enough to be really 
])rofitable. The future supply of good timber in Ohio will conse- 
<^uently depeud mostly upon systematic forest culture, and those first 
ougaging in it will find ample remuneration for auy capital or labor 
employed. They may derive a fortune from comparatively poor land, 
unfit for grain crops and of little account for pasturage. 

Locust, although being a very hard and solid timber, will make 
fence posts and pavement blocks in eight years from the seed, and 
large trees in twelve years. Its beautiful golden yellow color, mixed 
with jet black, makes it well adapted for elegant furniture. Catalpa, 
which makes the best railroad ties, grows even quicker. Hickory, 
now largely exported to Europe, and coming in great demand there, 
will prove exceedingly profitable. Sown in rows three feet apart, 
the nuts six inches apart, the young trees will grow up straight and 
islender. In five years thiuniug out may commence, and hoop-poles 
may be sold ; the next thinning out will give material for spokes and 
buggy fills; and the best trees, left standing at proper distances, will 
make a fine forest in less than twenty years. Black Walnut is a 
slower grower, but it is getting so costly that it is worth while to think 
«f planting it for speculation. Men below the age of thirty-five years 
will be able to reap a rich harvest from the cultivation of this valuable 
timber before they have passed the best time of life. A forty-acre 
h)t of Black Walnut forest, now planted, will, in twenty-five years, 
make its owner independently Avealthy, without requiring much outlay 
or labor. I am told that a gentlemen, who twenty years ago, planted 
twelve acres of land in Southern Indiana with pecan nuts, made a 
fortune by it, and created the source of a lai-ge yearly revenue. 

But the most profitable branch of forestry is certainly the cultiva- 
tion of oak for tan-bark on the renewal or Hackwald system. The 
iicorns (about six bushels to the acre) will be laid six inches apart 
ivnd in rows three feet distant. The young saplings taken out by 
thinning may be used to great advantage in planting. In twelve 
years (under very fixvorable conditions even sooner) the trees will be 
hirge enough for cutting and peeling. Isew sprouts will grow out from 
the roots in the same year, and the second growth will prove more 
thrifty than the first. The revenue from such forests may be called 
perpetual. In Europe vast tracts of second class land are forested in 
this manner, aud many formerly unproductive estates have been made 
highly valuable by this very Hackwald culture. The bark of the 
young and middle-sized trees contains more tsuinin and is therefore of 
higher value than that taken from old trees. Here in Ohio the bark 
of the chestnut-leaved oak is preferred to all others and almost exclu- 
sively used. The tree is a more rapid grower than other varieties of 
oak and is satisfied with the poorest of soil. 

One of the most intelligent and experienced of the Cincinnati tan- 
ners informs me that in Cincinnati alone 18,000 cords of tan-bark are 
u^ed per year, and even a larger quantity in Louisville. Seven trees of 
a foot in diameter will furnish one cord. The chestnut-leaved oak never 
forms entire forests In' spontaneous growtli, but is interspersed among 
other timber. My informant counted the chestnut-leaved oak-trees ou 



ARBOR DAY i:XERCISES. 43 

a comparatively very well-stocked 15,000 acre lot in Pulaski County, 
Ky., and found them to number 3,500. At that rate the tanneries 
of Cincinnati and Louisville alone would every year use up the trees 
spontaneously growing on about 100,000 acres of land. The few years 
f^ince the Cincinnati and Southern llailroad has been in operation a 
belt of fourteen miles on both sides of the road, and of about two 
hundred miles in length, has been almost totally depleted of that val- 
uable variety of timber. The same gentleman ventures to predict 
that within twenty years from now the entire supply of chestnut-oak 
bark in the United States will be exhausted. The price now vax'ies 
from Sl-Jr to $28 per cord, and is steadily increasing. From carefully 
prepared reports of the forestry departments of the several German 
States and of Austria, it appears that an acre of properly cultivated 
Hackwald of the age of twelve years will furnish from four to five cords 
of tan-bark, and about six thousand feet of timber (board measure) fit 
for posts and for wagon-makers' work. The revenue from the wood 
covers all the expenses of planting and managing, leaving a surplus. 
Under such circumstances, the foresting of inferior lands in Ohio, 
Kentucky, or West Virginia could not fail to lay the foundation of 
wealth for those who would now engage in it. Large tracts of such 
lands are now lying waste. The income derived therefrom is now 
generally not sufficient to pay the taxes and interest on the original 
purchase money. By the means of forest culture, they might be 
easily turned into well-paying estates, and while they are now not 
much more than a public nuisance, they may become an ornament of 
the State and a great benefit for llie general public. 

EMIL ROTHE. 

VILLAGE IMPROVEMENT SOCIETIES. 

In order to assist in organizing Village Improvement Societies, the 
following Constitution is given here. It is modeled after the constitu- 
ti<m of the Laurel Hill Association of Stockbridge, Conn., and of the 
Wyomiug and College Hill (Hamilton County, O.,) Village Im- 
provement Societies. 

ARTICLE I. 

This Society shall be calle^l the Improvement Society. 

ARTICLE II. 

The object of this Society shall be to improve and ornament the 
streets and public grounds of the village by planting and cultivating 
trees, establishing and protecting grass-plats and borders in the ave- 
nues, and generally doing whatever may tend to the improvement of 
the village as a place of residence. 

ARTICLE III. 

The business of the Society shall be conducted by a board of nuie 
directors — five gentlemen and four ladies, to be elected annually l)y 
the Society — who shall ccmstitute the board. This board shall, from 
its own number, elect one President, two Vice-presidents, a Secretary, 
and Treasurer, and shall appoint such committees as they may deem 
advisable to further the ends of the Society. 



44 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 



ARTICLE IV. 



It shall be the duty of the President, and, in his absence, of the 
senior Vice-president, to preside at all meetings of the Society, and to 
carry out all orders of the Board of Directors. 

ARTICLE V. 

It sliall be the duty of the Secretary to keep a correct and careful 
record of all proceedings of the Society and of the Board of Direc- 
tors, in a book suitable lor their preservation, and such other duties as 
ordinarily pertain to the office. 

ARTICLE VI. 

It shall be the duty of the Treasurer to keep the funds of the 
Society, and to make such disbursements as may be ordered by the 
Board of Directors. 

ARTICLE vn. 

No debt shall be contracted by the Board of Directors beyond the 
amount of available funds within their control to pay it, and no mem- 
ber of this Society shall be liable for any debt of the Society beyond 
the amount of his or her subscription. 

ARTICLE vm. 

Any adult person may become a member of this Society by paying 
two dollars ($2.00) annually. Any person not of age who shall 
plant and protect a tree, under the direction of the Board of Direct- 
ors, or shall pay the sum of $1.00 annually, may become a member of 
this Society until of age, after which time their annual dues shall be 
increased to two dollars ($2.00), the same as other adults. 

ARTICLE ix. 

The annual meeting of the Society shall be held during the first 
week of October, at such place as the Board of Directors may select, 
and a notice of such meeting shall be posted in prominent places 
through the village. Other meetings of the Society may be called by 
the Board of Directors when desirable. 

ARTICLE 'X. 

At the annual meeting, the Board of Directors shall report the 
amount of money received during the year, and the source from 
which it has been received; the amount of money expended during 
the year, and the objects for which it has been expended; the number 
of trees planted at the cost of the Society, and the number planted by 
individuals ; and, generally, all acts of the Board that may be of in- 
terest to the Society. This report shall be entered on the record of 
the Society. 

ARTICLE XI. 

This Constitution may be amended with the approval of two- 
thirds of the members present, at any annual meeting of the Society, 
or at any special meeting called for that j)urpose, a month's notice of 
the proposed amendment, with its object, having been given. 



I^A.RT SKCOND. 



SELECTIONS ON TREES 



FOR 



Arbor Day Celebrations. 



jl^c g^r>ec of -tl^c ^teld «g ^a«^§ ^tfc." — BIBLE. 



It is gratifying to see Ohio take such deep interest in tree-planting, 
which is beginning so strongly to attract public attention. Setting 
apart one day for this purpose and making it a general holiday will 
add attractiveness to utility, and give it a deeper hold on the popular 
heart. But the happiest thought of all was to niake it a holiday for 
the public schools, and have the children practically take part in it and 
set out groups of trees for their favorite authors. You thus not only 
connect trees Avith the associations of childhood and their pleasantest 
holidays, but with authors from Avhom they receive their earliest and 
best impressions. 

We sometimes forget that the highest aim of education is to form 
right character — and that is accomplished more by impressions made 
upon the heart than by knowledge imparted to the mind. 

The awakening of our best sympathies — the cultivation of our best 
and purest tastes — strengthening the desire to be useful and good, and 
directing youthful ambition to unselfish ends — such are the objects of 
true education. Surely nothing can be better calculated to procure 
these ends than the holiday set apart for the public schools. 

J. T. Headley : Extract from Letter. 



When we plant a tree, we are doing what we can to make our 
planet a more wholesome and happier dwelling-place for those who 
come after us if not for ourselves. 

As you drop the seed, as you plant the sapling, your left hand 
hardly knows what your right hand is doing. But Nature knows, 
and in due time the Power that sees and works in secret will reward 
you openly. You have been warned against hiding your talent in a 
napkin ; but if your talent takes the form of a maple-key or an acorn, 
and your napkin is a slired of the apron that covers " the lap of the 
earth," you may hide it there, unblamed ; and when you render in 
your account you will find that your deposit has been drawing com- 
pound interest all the time. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes: Extract from Letter. 



46 TRKES AND TRKE-PL ANTING. 

We wish to wake up the people of Ohio to tlie vahie of their forests, 
and to prevent the fulfillment of the prediction of Bryant's Indian at the 
burial-place of his fathers : 

But I behold a fearful sign, 
To Avhich the white man's eyes are blind. 
Before these fields were shorn and tilled, 

Full to the brim our rivers flowed, 
The melody of waters filled 

The fresh and boundless wood. 
And torrents dashed and rivulets played. 
And fountains sported in the shade. 
These grateful sounds are heard no more. 

The springs are silent in the sun, 
The rivers, by the blackened shore. 

With lessening currents run ; 
The realm our tribes are crushed to get 
May be a barren desert yet. 



The trees may- outlive the memory of more than one of those in 
whose honor they were planted. But if it is something to make two 
blades of grass grow where only one was growing, it is much more to 
have been the occasion of the planting of an oak which shall defy 
twenty scores of Winters, or of an elm which shall canopy with its 
green cloud of foliage half as many generations of mortal immortal- 
ities. I have written many verses, but the best poems I have 
produced are the trees I planted on the hill-side which overlooks 
the broad meadows, scalloped and rounded at their edges by loops 
of the sinuous Housatonic. Nature finds rhymes.for them in the re- 
curring measures of the seasons. Winter strips them of their orna- 
ments and gives them, as it were, in prose translation, and Summer 
reclothes them in all the splendid phrases of their leafy language. 

What are these maples and beeches and birches but odes and idyls 
and madrigals ? What are these pines and firs and spruces but holy 
hymns, too solemn for the many-hued raiment of their gay deciduous 
neighbors? Oliver Wendell Holmes: Extract from Letter. 



The objects of the restoration of the forests are as multifarious aa 
the motives which have led to their destruction, and as the evils which 
that destruction has occasioned. The planting of the mountains will 
diminish the frequency and violence of river inundations, prevent the 
formation of torrents ; mitigate the extremes of atmospheric tempera- 
ture, humidity, and precipitation ; restore dried-up springs, rivulets, 
and sources of irrigation ; shelter the fields from chilling and from 
parching winds; prevent the spread of miasmatic effluvia; and, 
finally, furnish an inexhaustible and self-renewing supply of material 
indispensable to so many purposes of domestic comfort, to the success- 
ful exercise of every act of peace, every destructive energy of war. 

George P. Marsit, "Man and Nature." 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 47 

THE WAYSIDE INN— AN APPLE-TREE. 

I HALTED at a pleasant inu, 

As I my way was wending — 
A golden ai)ple was the sign, 

From knotty bough depending. 

Mine host — it was an api)le-tree — 

He smilingly received me, 
And spread his choicest, sweetest fruit, 

To strengthen and relieve me. 

Full many a little feathered guest 

Came through his branches springing; 
They hopped and flew from spray to spray, 

Their notes of gladness singing. 

Beneath his shade I laid me down, 

And slumber sweet possessed me; 
The soft wind blowing through the leaves 

With whispers low caressed me. 

And when I rose, and would have paid 

My host so open-hearted, 
He only shook his lofty head — 

I blessed him, and departed. 

Fkom the German. 

I LOVE thee in the Spring, 
Earth-crowning forest! when amid the shades 
The gentle South first waves her odorous wing, 

And joy fills all the glades. 

In the hot Summer time, 
With deep delight, the somber aisles I roam, 
Or, soothed by some cool brook's melodious chime 

Rest on thy verdant loam. 

But O, when Autumn's hand 
Hath marked thy beauteous foliage for the grave, 
How doth thy splendor, as entranced I stand. 

My willing heart enslave! 

Wm. Jewett Pabodie. 



The groves were God's fiist temples. Ere man learned 
To hew the shaft and lay the architrave, 
And spread the roof above them, — ere lie framed 
The lofty vault to gather and roll back 
The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood. 
Amidst this cool and silence, he knelt down, 
And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks 
And supplication. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



48 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 



FOREST SONG. 



A SONG for the beautiful trees, 

A song for the forest grand, 

The garden of God's own hand, 
The pride of his centuries. 
Hurrah ! for the kingly oak, 

For the maple, the forest queen, 
For the lords of the emerald cloak, 

For the ladies in living green. 

For the beautiful trees a song, 

The ])eers of a glorious realm. 

The linden, the ash, and the elm, 
So brave and majestic and strong. 
Hurrah ! for the beech tree trim, 

For tlie hickory staunch at core, 
For the locust, thorny and grim, 

For the silvery sycamore. 

A song for the palm, the pine, 

And for every tree that grows, 

From the desolate zone of snows 
To the zone of the burning line. 
Hurrah ! for the warders proud 

Of the mountain-side and vale. 
That cliallenge the lightning cloud, 

And buffet the stormy gale. 

A song for the forest aisled, 

AVith its Gothic roof sublime. 

The solemn temple of Time, 
Where man becometh a child, 
As he listens the anthem-roll 

Of the wind in the solitude. 
The hymn that telleth his soul 

That God is the Lord of the wood. 

So long r.s the rivers flow. 

So long as the mountains rise. 

May the forests sing to the skies. 
And shelter the earth below. 
Hurrah ! for the beautiful trees ! 

Hurrah ! for the forest grand. 
The pride of his centuries. 

The garden of God's own hand. 

Prof. W. H. Venablb. 
This Bong was written expressly for Cincinnati " Arbor Day," 1882. 



The wealth, beauty, fertility, and healthfulness of the country 
largely depend upon the conservation of our f )rests and the planting 
of trees. John Greknleaf Whittikk: Extract from Letter. 



ARBOIi DAY I':XERCISES. 49 

. SONG TO THE TKEES. 

I. 

Hail to the trees! 
Patient and generous, mothers of mankind, 
Arching the hills, the minstrels of the wind, 
Spring's glorious flowers, and Summer's balmy tents, 
A sharer in man's free and ha])])ier sense. 
From early blossom till the north wind calls 
Its drowsy sprites from beech-hid waterfollg. 
The trees bless all, and then, brown-mantled, stand 
The sturdy prophets of a golden land. 

II. 
Eden was clothed in trees ; their glossy leaves 
Gave raiment, food, and shelter ; 'ueath their eaves 
Dripping with ruby dew the flow'rets rose 
To follow man from Eden to his woes. 
The silver rill crept fragrant thickets through, 
The air was rich with life, a violet hue 
Tangling with sunshine lit the waving scene, 
Twas heaven, tree-born, tree-lulled, euwreathed in green. 

III. 

Where trees are not, behold the deserts swoon 
Beneath the brazen sun and mocking moon. 
Where trees are not, the tawny torrent leaps, 
A brawling savage from the crumbling steeps. 
Where once the ferns their gentle branches waved, 
And tender lilies in the crystal laved ; 
A brawling savage, plundering in a night, 
The fields it once strayed through a streamlet bright. 

IV. 

What gardeners like the trees; their loving care 
The daintiest blooms can deftly plant and rear. 
How smilingly with outstretched boughs they stand 
To shade the flowers too fragile for man's hand. 
With scented leaves, crisp, ripened, nay, not dead, 
They tuck the wild flowers in their moss-rimmed bed. 
The forest nook outvies the touch of art. 
The heart of man loves not like the oak's heart. 

V. 

O whispering trees, companions, sages, friends, 
No change in you, whatever friendship ends; 
No deed of yours the Eden link e'er broke ; 
Bared is your head to ward the lightning's stroke. 
You fed the infant man, and blessed his cot, 
Hewed from your grain; without you he were not. 
The hand that planned you planned the future, too. 
Shall we distrust it, knowing such as you? 

4 



50 TREES AND TREE-^LANTING. 



And when comes Eden back ? The trees are here, 
In all their olden beauty and glad cheer. 
Eden but waits the lifting of the night, 
For man to know the true and Avill the right. 
Whatever creed may find in hate a birth, 
One of the heavens is this teeming earth; 
"Of all its gifts but innocence restore, 
And Eden," sigh the trees, "is at your door." 

Joseph W. IMiller, 
This poem was written expressly for Cincinnati " Arbor Day," 1882. 



THE OAK. 

A GLOEious tree is the old gray oak ; 
He has stood for a thousand years — 
Has stood and frowned 
On the trees around, 
Like a king among his peers ; 
As around their king they stand, so now, 

When the flowers their j)ale leaves fold, 
The tall trees round him stand, arrayed 
In their robes of purple and gold. 
He has stood like a tower 
Through sun and shower, 
And dared the winds to battle; 
He has heard the hail. 
As from plates of mail, 
From his own limbs shaken, rattle ; 
He has tossed them about, and shorn the tops 

(When the storm has roused his might) 
Of the forest trees, as a strong man doth 
The heads of his foes in fight. 

George Hill : "Fall of the Oak. 



When the sun begins to fling 
His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring 
To ai'ched walks of twilight groves, 
And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves. 
Of pine or monumental oak. 



Milton. 



'Tis beautiful to see a forest stand. 

Brave with its moss-grown monarchs and the pride 
Of foliage dense, to which the south wind bland 

Comes with a kiss as lover to his bride; 
To watch the light grow fainter, as it streams 

Through arching aisles, where branches interlace, 
Where somber pines rise o'er the shadowy gleams 

Of silver birch, trembling with modest grace. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 51 

What conqueror in any part of "life's broad field of battle" could 
desire a more beautiful, a more noble, or a more patriotic monument 
than a tree planted by the hands of pure and joyous children, as a 
memorial of his achievements? 

What earnest, honest worker with hand and brain, for the bene- 
fit of his fellowmen, could desire a more j)leasing recognition of his 
usefulness than such a monument, a symbol of his or her produc- 
tions, ever growing, ever blooming, and ever bearing wholesome 
fruit? 

Trees already grown ancient have been consecrated by the pres- 
ence of eminent personages or by some conspicuous event in our na- 
tional history, such as the Elm tree at Philadelphia, at which William 
Penn made his famous treaty with nineteen tribes of barbarians ; the 
Charter Oak at Hartford, which preserved the written guarantee of 
the liberties of the Colony of Connecticut; the wide-spreading Oak 
tree of Flushing, Long Island, under which George Fox, the founder 
of the Society of Friends or Quakers, preached ; tlie lofty Cypress 
tree in the Dismal Swamp under which Washington reposed one 
night in his young manhood ; the huge French Apple tree near Ft. 
Wayne, lud., where Little Turtle, the great Miami chief, gathered 
his warriors ; the Elm tree at Cambridge, in the shade of which Wash- 
ington first took command of the Continental army on a hot Sum- 
mer's day ; the Tulip tree on King's Mountain battlefield in South 
Carolina, on which ten bloodthirsty Tories were hung at one time ; 
the tall Pine tree at Ft. Edward, N. Y., under which the beautiful 
Jane McCrea was slain ; the magnificent Black Walnut tree, near 
Haverstraw on the Hudson, at which General Wayne mustered his 
fijrces at midnight, preparatory to his gallant and successful attack 
on Stony Point ; the grand Magnolia tree near Charleston, S. C, under 
whicli General Lincoln held a council of war previous to surrendering 
the city ; the great Pecan tree at Villere's plantation, below New Or- 
leans, under which a portion of the remains of General Packenham 
was buried, and the Pear trees planted, respectively, by Governor 
Endicott, of Massachusetts, and Governor Stuyvesant, of New York, 
more than two hundred years ago. 

These trees all have a place in our national history, and are in- 
separable from it because they were so consecrated. My eyes have 
seen all but one of them, and patriotic emotions were excited at the 
sight. How much more significant and suggestive is the dedication 
of a young tree as a monument. 

Benson J. Lossing, Historian: Extract from Letter. 



The project of cpnnecting the planting of trees with the names of 
authors is a beautiful one, and one certain to exert a beneficial in- 
fluence upon the children who participate in these exercises. The in- 
stitution of an "Arbor Day" is highly commendable from its artistic 
consequences, and can not fail to result in great benefit to the cli- 
mate and to the commercial interests of the country when it becomes 
an institution of general adoption. 

Prof. B. Pickman Mann, son of Horace Mann: Extract from Letter. 



52 TREES AND TREE-PEANTING. 

A LITTLE of thy steadfastness, 
Rounded with leafy gracefuluess, 

Old oak, give me — 
That the world's blast may round me blow, 
And I yield gently to and fro, 
While my stout-hearted trunk below, 
And firm-set roots unshaken be. 

Lowell. 

From the earth's loosened mould 

The sapling draws sustenance and thrives ; 

Though stricken to tlie heart with Winter's cold, 
The di'ooping tree revives. 

The softly warbled song 

Comes from the pleasant woods, and colored wings 
Glance quick in the bright sun, that moves along 

The forest openings. 

When the bright sunset fills 

The silver woods with light, the green slope throws 
Its shadow in the hollows of the hills. 

And wide the upland grows. 

Longfellow. 

It is a great pleasure to think of the young people assembling to 
celebrate the planting of trees, and connecting them with the names 
of authors wliose works are the farther and higher products of our 
dear old Mother Nature. An Oriental poet says of his hero : 

" Sunshine was he in a Wintery place, 
And in midsummer cuohiess and shade." 

Such are all true thinkers, and no truer monuments of them can 
exist than beautiful trees. Our word book Ls from the beech tablets 
ou whicli men used to write. Our word Bible is from the Greek for 
bark of a tree. Our word paper is i'rom the tree papyrus — the tree 
Avhicli Emerson found the most interesting thing he saw in Sicily. Our 
word library is from the Latin liber, bark of a tree. Thus literature 
is traceable in the growth of trees, and was originally written ou 
leaves and wooden tablets. The West responds to the East in associat- 
ing great writers with groups of trees, and a grateful posterity will 
appreciate the poetry of this idea as well while it enjoys the shade and 
beauty which the schools are securing for it. 

MoNcuRE D. Conway: Extract from Letter. 



Imparting to Avaste places more than their pristine beauty and 
associating the names of departed loved ones with our work is a po- 
etic and subHme conception. It symbolizes our faith in a resurrection 
to a higher and better hfe when the hard struggles of this sin-cursed 
world are passed. Gen. Samuel F. Gary: Extract from Letter. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 53 

They who dwell beside the stream and hill 

Prize little treasures there so kindly giveu : 
The song of birds, the babbling of tlie rill, 

The pure, unclouded light and aid of heaven. 
They walk as those who seeing can not see, 

Blind to this beauty even from their birth ; 
We value little blessings ever free ; 

We covet most the rarest things of earth. 

But rising from the dust of busy streets 

These forest children gladdeu many hearts ; 
As some old friend their welcome presence greets 

The toil-worn soul, and fresher life imparts. 
Their shade is doubly grateful when it lies 

Above the glare which stifling walls throw back ; 
Through quivering leaves we see tiie soft blue skies. 

Then happier tread the dull, unvaried track. 

Alice B. Neal: *' Trees in the City." 



THE FOREST FLOWERS. 



Our forests are fast disappearing. In their sheltering shade and 
the rich mold of their annually decay injn: leaves, the greater number 
of our loveliest plants are found ; and when the ax comes, that cruel 
weapon that wars uj^on nature's freshness, and the noble oak, the elm, 
the beech, the maple, and the tulip-tree fall with a loud crash in the 
peaceful solitude, even the very birds can understand that a floral 
death-knell sounds through the melodious wilderness. 

A number of our choicest plants are threatened with extinction ; 
for as the woods are cleared away these tender offsprings, the pretty 
flowers, which we so dearly cherish, will perish utterly. It is, there- 
fore, well to prevent as far as possible the destruction of our native 
forests, as well as to plant forest trees, if for no other purpose than 
the preservation of the little helpless, blooming beauties that adorn 
our woodland shades. 

GUSTAVUS FUANKENSTEIN. 



Of the infinite variety of fruits which spring from the bosom of 
the earth, the trees of the wood are greatest in dignity. Of all the 
works of the creation which know the changes of life and death, the 
trees of the forest have the longest existence. Of all the objects 
which crown the gray earth, the woods preserve unchanged, through- 
out the greatest reach of time, their native character. The works of 
man are ever varying their aspect ; his towns and his fields alike reflect 
the unstable opinions, the fickle wills and fancies Of each passing gen- 
eration ; but the forests on his borders remain to-day tlie same they 
were ages of years since. Old as the everlasting hills, during thou- 
sands of seasons they have put forth, and laid down their verdure in 
calm obedience to the decree which first hade them cover the ruins of 
the Deluge. Susan Fenimore Cooper: " Jiural Hours." 



64 trp:es and tree-planting. 

The monarch oak, the patriot of the trees, 
Shoots rising up, and spreads by slow degrees; 
Three centuries he grows, and then he stays 
Supreme in state; and in three more decays. 

Dkyden. 

The young oak grew, and proudly grew, 

For its roots were deep and strong; 
And a shadow broad on the earth it threw. 

And the sunshine linger'd long 
On its glossy leaf, where the flickering light 

Was flung to the evening sky; 
And the wild bird sought to its airy height, 

And taught her young to fly. 

Mrs. E. Oakes Smith : " The Acorn." 



A TREE, to the thoughtful and loving student of nature, suggests 
ideas of beauty and perfection to which the mind can not be lifted, 
save by a process of wondering admiration. 

Francis George Heath. 



Alas, in how many places is the forest which once lent us shade 
nothing more than a memory! The grave and noble circle which 
adorned the mountain is every day contracting. Where you come in 
hope of seeing life, you find but the image of death. O, who will really 
undertake the defense of the trees, and rescue them from senseless 
destruction? Who will eloquently set forth their manifold mission, 
and their active and incessant assistance in tlie regulation of the laws 
which rule our globe? Without them, it seems delivered over to 
blind destiny, which will involve it again in chaos! The motive 
powers and purificators of the atmosphere through the respiration of 
their foliage, avaricious collectors to the advantage of future ages of 
the solar heat, it is they which pacify the storm and avert its most 
disastrous consequences. In the low-lying plains, which have no out- 
let for their waters, the trees, long before the advent of man, drained 
the soil by their roots, forcing the stagnant waters to descend and 
construct at a lower depth their useful reservoirs. And now, on the 
abrupt declivities, they consolidate the crumbling soil, check and bi-eak 
the torrent, control the melting of the snows, and preserve to the 
meadows the fertile humidity which in due time will overspread them 
with a sea of flowers. 

And is not this enough? To watch over the life of the plant and 
its general harmony, is it not to watch over the safety of humanity? 

The tree, again,' was created for the nurture of man, to assist him 
in his industries and his arts. It is owing to the tree, to its soul, 
^-arth-buried for so many centuries, and now restored to light, that we 
have secured the wings of the steam-engine. 

Thank Heaven for the trees! With my feeble voice I claim for 
them the gratitude of man. 

Madame Michelet: " Nature, or the Foetry of Earth and Sea." 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 55 

O, WHO is there withiu whose heart 

The love of noble mauhood dwells, 
Who feels the thrill of pleasure start 

When other tongue the story tells 

Of deeds sublime ? with true eye sees 

The beautiful iu art and thought — 
Dares stand l)efore God's stately trees, 

Declaring that he loves them not? 

Companions of our childhood days ! 

Companions still, though grown we be! 
Still through thy leaves the light breeze strays. 

Whispering the sauie old songs to me. 

Dear forest ! down thy long aisles dim 
Soft sweeps the zephyr's light caress ; 

Worthy indeed art thou of Him 
Who made thee in thy loveliness. 

Long may thy graceful branches wave. 

Piercing with pride the balmy air ; 
Harm ne'er would come if I could save — 

Fit objects of our love and care. 

But though erect each noble form, 

As year by year rolls swift along 
Thou too, like man, must face the storm, 

And fall — or live to be more strong. 

Forever upward, day by day. 

Patient thy growing branches turn ; 
Nearer the heavens each year alway — 

May we the simple lesson learn — 

Though few our years or many be, 
It matters not the number given, 
If we can feel that, like the tree. 

Each year hath found us nearer heaven. 

Maggie May Welsh, Lancaster, O. 
Written for Cincinnati "Arbor Day" Celebrations. 



What a noble gift to man are the forests ! What a debt of grati- 
tude and admiration we ow^e for their utility and their beauty ! How 
pleasantly the shadows of the wood fall upon our heads when w^e turn 
from the glitter and turmoil of the world of man ! The winds of 
heaven seem to linger amid their balmy branches, and the sunshine 
falls like a blessing upon the green leaves ; the wild breath of the for- 
est, fragrant with bark and berry, fans the brow with grateful fresh- 
ness ; and the beautiful woodlight, neither garish nor gloomy, full of 
calm and peaceful influences, sheds repose over the spirit. 

Susan Fenimore Cooper: "Rural Hours" 



56 TREES AND TKEE-PLANTINO. 



THE FOREST. 



I LOVE thee when thy swelling hiuls appear, 

And one by one their tender leaves unfold, 
As if they knew that warmer suns were near, 

Nor longer sought to hide from Winter's cold ; 
And when with darker growth thy leaves are seen 

To veil from view the eiirly robin's nest, 
I love to lie beneath thy wooing screen, 

With limbs by Summer's heat and toil oppress'd ; 
And when the Autumn wind has stripped thee bare, 

And round thee lies the smooth, untrodden snow, 
When naught is thine that made thee once so fair, 

I love to watch thy shadowy form below. 
And through thy leafless arms to look al)ove 
On stars that brighter beam when most we need their love. 

Jones Very : " The Tree." 



The heave, the wave, and bend 
Of everlasting trees, whose busy leaves 
Rustle their songs of praise, while ruin weaves 
A robe of verdure for their yielding bark, 
While mossy garlands, full and rich and dark. 
Creep slowly round them! Monarch of the wood, 
Whose mighty scepters sway the mountain brood, 

Shelter the winged idolaters of Day — 
And grapple with the storm-god, hand to hand, 
Then drop like weary pyramids away. 
Stupendous monuments of calm decay. 

Jonx Neal. 

Welcome, ye shades ! ye bowery thickets, hail ! 
Ye lofty pines ! ye venerable oaks ! 
Ye ashes wild ! Resounding o'er the steep ! 
Delicious is your shelter to the soul. 

Thomson. 



Most worthy of the oaken wreath 
The ancients him esteemed, 

Who, in a battle had from death 
Some man of wortli redeemed. 



Drayton. 



There oft the muse, what most delights her, sees 

Long living galleries of aged trees. 

Bold sons of earth, that lift their arms so high. 

As if once- they would invade the sky. 

In such green palaces the first kings reigned, 

Slept in their shade, and angels entertained ; 

With such old councilors they did advise, 

And, by frequenting sacred groves, grew wise. 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISIS. 

THE OAK. 

With his gnarled old arms and his iron form, 

Majestic in the wood, 
From age to age, in sun and storm, 

The live-oak long has stood ; 
And generations come and go, 

And still he stands upright, 
And he sternly looks on the world below, 

As conscious of his might. 



57 



A SONG to the oak, the brave old oak. 

Who hath ruled in the greenwood long? 
Here 's health and renown to his broad green crown, 

And his fifty arms so strong ! 
There's fear in his frown, when the sun goes down, 

And the fire in the west fades out ; 
And he showeth his might on a wild midnight, 

When the storm through his branches shout. 

Then here's to the oak, the brave old oak, 

Who stands in his pride alone ; 
And still flourish he, a hale green tree, 

When a hundred years are gone. 

H. F. ClIORLEY. 

Oh ! come to the woodlands, 't is joy to behold, 

The new wakend buds in our pathway unfold; 

For Spring has come forth, and the bland southern breeze 

Is telling the tale to the shrub and the trees. 

Which, anxious to show her 

The duty they owe her, 
Have decked themselves gayly in emerald and gold. 



Welcome, pure thoughts! welcome, ye silent groves! 
These guests, these courts, my soul most dearly loves ; 
Now the winged people of the sky shall sing 
My cheerful anthems to the gladsome Spring; 
And if contentment be a stranger, — then 
I '11 ne'er look for it, but in heaven again. 

SiE Henry Wotton. 

The oak, for grandeur, strength, and noble size, 

Excels all trees that in the forest grow ; 
From acorn small, that trunk, those branches rise. 

To which such signal benefits we owe. 
Behold, what shelter in its ample shade, 

From noontide sun, or from the drenching ram. 
And of its timber stanch, vast ships are made. 

To sweep rich cargoes o'er the watery main. 



58 TEEES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

Proud mouarch of the forest ! 

That once a sapling bough, 
Didst quail far more at evening's breath 

Thau at the tempest now. 
Strange scenes have pass'd, long ages roll'd 

Since first upon tliy stem, 
Then weak as osier twig, Spring set 

Her leafy diadem. 

To thee but little recks it 

What seasons come or go ; 
Thou lov'st to breathe the gale of Spring 

And bask in Summer's glow ; 
But more to feel the Wintry winds 

Sweep by in awful mirth. 
For well thou know'st each blast will fix 

Thy roots more deep in earth. 

Would that to me life's changes 

Did thus with blessings come ! 
That mercies might, like gales of Spring 

Cause some new grace to bloom ! 
And that the storm which scattereth 

Each earth-born hope abroad, 
Might anchor those of holier birth 

More firmly on my God. 



Oh, Rosalind ! these trees shall be my books, 
And in their barks my thoughts I'll character, 
That every eye which in this forest looks 
Shall see thy virtue witnessed everywhere. 

Shakesi'eare: "As You Like It." 



Teachers will please give the pupils the following account of the wav 
in which Mr. Morris came to write tiie poem, " Woodman, Spare that Tree. ' 
The poem should then be memorized by all the pupils, and recited or sung 
on " Arbor Day." Mr. Morris, in a letter to a friend, dated New York, 
February 1, 1837, gave in substance the following account. Riding out of 
town a few days since, in company with a friend, an old gentleman, he in- 
vited me to turn down a little, romantic woodland pass, not far from Bloom- 
ingdale. " Your object?" inquired I. " Merely to look once more at an old 
tree planted by my grandfather long before I was born, under which I used 
to play when a boy, and where my sisters i)layed witli me. There I often 
listened to tlie good advice of my parents. Father, mother, sisters — all are 
gone ; nothing but the old tree remains." And a paleness overspread his 
fine countenance, and tears came to his eyes. After a moment's pause, he 
added : "Do n't think me foolish. I don't know how it is: I never ride out 
but I turn down this lane to look at that old tree. I have a thousand rec- 
ollections about it, and I always greet it as a familiar and well-remembered 
friend." These words were scarcely uttered when the old gentleman cried 
out, "There it is !" Near the tree stood a man with his coat oif, sharpening 
an ax. "You're not going to cut that tree down, surely?" "Yes, but I 



ARBOR DAY EXERCISES. 59 

am, though," said the woodman. "What for?" inquired the old gentle- 
man, with choked emotion. " What for? I like that ! Well, I will tell you. 
I want the tree for firewood." " What is the tree worth to you for firewood ?" 
" Why, when down, about ten dollars." " Suppose I should give you that 
sum," said the old gentleman, " would you let it stand?" "Yes." "You 
are sure of that?" "Positive!" "Then give me a bond to that eflfect." 
We went into the little cottage in which my companion was born, but which 
is now occupied by the woodman. I drew up the bond. It was signed, 
and the money paid over. As we left, the young girl, the daughter of the 
woodman, assured us that while she lived the tree should not be cut. These 
circumstances made a strong impression on my mind, and furnished me 
with the materials for the song I send you. 

Woodman, spare that tree ! 

Touch not a single bough ! 
In youth it sheltered me, 

And I 'II protect it now. 
'T was my forefather's hand 

That placed it near his cot; 
There, woodman, let it stand ; 

Thy ax shall harm it not ! 

That old familiar tree, 

Whose glory and renown 
Are spread o'er land and sea, — 

And wouldst thou hack it down ? 
Woodman, forbear thy stroke ! 

Cut not its earth-bound ties ; 
O, spare that -aged oak, 

Now towering to the skies ! 

When but an idle boy 

I sought its grateful shade ; 
In all their gushing joy, 

Here, too, my sisters played. 
My mother kissed me here ; 

My father pres.sed my hand — 
Forgive the foolish tear ; 

But let that old oak stand. 

My heart-strings round thee cling, 

Close as thy bark, old friend; 
Here shall the wild-bird sing. 

And still thy branches bend. 
Old tree ! the storm still brave ! 

And, woodman, leave the spot; 
While I 've a hand to save, 

Thy ax shall harm it not. 

George P. Morris. 



60 TREES AND TREE-PI.ANTING. 



The followingr additional selections on trees were made by 
Prof. W. H. Venable. 



If I could put my woods in song, 

And tell Avliat's there enjoyed, 
All men would to my garden throng, 

And leave the cities void. 

In ray plot no tulips blow — 

Snow-loving pines and oaks instead ; 
And rank the savage maples grow 

From Spring's faint flush to Autumn red. 

My garden is a forest ledge, 

Which older forests bound ; 
The banks slope down to the blue lake-edge, 

Then plunge to depths profound. 

Emerson: "My Garden. 



My fugitive years are all hasting away. 

And I jnust erelong be as lowly as they ; 

With a turf on my breast and a stone at my head, 

Ere another such grove shall arise in its stead. 

WiLLIA.M COWPER. 

Oh! bear me then to vast embowering shades; 
To twilight groves, and visionary vales; 
To weeping grottoes, and prophetic glooms ! 
Where angel forms athwart the solemn dusk 
Tremendous, sweep, or seem to sweep, along; 
And voices, more than human, through the void, 
Deep-sounding, seize the enthusiastic ear. 

Thomson: ''Autumn.''* 

Here Nature does a house for me erect, 
Nature, the wisest architect. 

Who those fond artists does despise 
That can the fair and living trees neglect, 

Yet the dead timber prize. 

Cowley. 



O, WILLOW, why forever weep. 

As one who mourns an endless wrong? 

What hidden woe can lie so deep? 
What utter grief can last so long? 

Mourn on forever, unconsoled. 

And keep your secret, faithful tree! 
No heart in all the world can hold 

A sweeter grace than constancy. 

Elizabeth A. Allen, 



ARBOR DAY EXP^RCISES. 61 

I CAKE not how men trace their ancestry, 

To ape or Adam; let them please their whim; 

But I, in June, am midway to believe 

A tree among my far progenitors — 

Such sympathy is mine ■svitii all the race. 

James Russell Lowej-l. 



Nay, doubt we not that under the rough rind, 

In the green veins of these fair growths of earth, 

There dwells a nature that receives delight 

From all the gentle processes of life, 

And shrinks from loss of being. Dim and faint 

May be the sense of pleasure and of pain. 

As in our dreams ; but, haply, real still. 

BiiYANT: '^ Among the Trees." 



Now saucy Phoebus' scorching beams, 

In flaming Summer pride, 
Dry-withering waste my foamy streams, 

And drink my crystal tide. 

"Would, then, my noble master please, 
To grant my highest wishes, 

He '11 shade my banks wi' tow'ring trees 
And bonnie sj:)readiug bushes. 

Let lofty firs and ashes cool, 

My lowly banks o'erspread. 
And view, deep bending in the pool, 

Their shadows' wat'ry bed. 

Let fragrant birks, in woodbines drest 

My craggy cliffs adorn ; 
And, for the little songster's nest. 

The close embow'riug thorn. 



EoBEET Burns. 



THE POPLAR FIELD. 



The poplars are felled ; farewell to the shade. 
And the whispering sound of the cool colonnade. 
The winds play no longer and sing in tlie leaves, 
Nor Ouse on his bosom their image receives. 

Twelve years have elapsed since I first took a view 
Of my favorite field, and the bank where they grew ; 
And now in the grass, behold, they are laid. 
And the tree is my seat that once lent me a shade. 

The blackbird has fled to another retreat, 
Where the hazels aflford him a screen from the heat, 
And the scene where his melody charmed me before 
Resounds with his sweet flowing ditty no more. 



62 TEEES AND TREE-PLANTING. 

Time made thee wliat thou Avast, king of the woods ; 
And time hath made thee what thou art — a cave 
For owls to roost in. Once thy spreading boughs 
O'erhung the champaign ; and the numerous flocks 
That grazed it, stood beneath that ample cope 
Uncrowded, yet safe sheltered from the storm. 
No flock frequents thee now. Thou hast outlived 
Thy popularity, and art become 
(Unless verse rescue thee awhile) a thing 
Forgotten, as the foliage of thy youth. 

Cowper: *' Yardly Oak." 



THE WOODLAND HALLO. 



In our cottage, that peeps from the skirts of the wood, 

I am mistress, no mother have I ; 
Yet blithe are my days, for my father is good. 

And kind is my lover, hard by. 
They both work together beneath the green shade — 

Both woodmen, my father and Joe ; 
Where I 've listened whole hours to the echo that made 

So much of a laugh or hallo. 

From my basket at noon they expect their supplj^ 

And with joy from my threshold .1 spring 
For the woodlands I love, and the oaks waving high, 

And Echo, that sings as I sing. 
Though deep shades delight me, yet love is my food 

As I call the dear name of my Joe ; 
His musical shout is the pride of the wood, 

And my heart leaps to hear the hallo. 

Simple flowers of the grove, little birds, live at ease, 

I wish not .to wander from you ; 
I'll still dwell beneath the deep roar of your trees. 

For I know that my Joe will be true. 
The trill of tlie robin, the coo of the dove, 

Are charms that I '11 never forego ; 
But, resting through life on the bosom of love, 

Will remember the Woodland Hallo. 

Robert Bloomfield. 



In June 't is good to lie beneath a tree 
While the blithe season comforts every sense, 
Steeps all the brain in rest, and heals the heart, 
Brimming it o'er with sweetness unawares. 
Fragrant and silent as that rosy snow. 
Wherewith the pitying apple tree fills up 
And tenderly lines some last-year robin's nest. 

Lowell. 



ARBOE DAY EXERCISES. 63 

Much can they praise the trees so straight and hy, 

Tlie sayliug pine, the cedar proud and tall ; 
The vine-j:)ropp ehne, the popUir never dry ; 

The builder oake, sole king of forests all ; 
The aspiue good for staves; tlie cypresse funerall ; 

The laurell, meed of mightie conquerors 
And poets' sage ; the firre that weepeth still ; 

The willow, worne of fori or ne jjaraniours ; 
The eugh obedient to the bender's will ; 

The birch for shaftes ; the sallow for the mill ; 
The niirrhe, sweet, bleeding in the bitter wound ; 

The warlike beech ; the ash for nothing ill ; 
The fruitful olive, and the platane round ; 

The carver holme ; the maple, seldom inward sound. 
Spenser: ^'Faerie Queen," Canto I. 



Hail, old patrician trees so great and good ! 
Hail, ye plebeian under-wood! 

Whei'e tlie poetic birds rejoice. 
And for their quiet nests and plenteous food 

Pay with their grateful voice. 

Hail, the poor Muses' richest manor-seat ! 
Ye country houses and retreat, 

Which all the happy gods so love, . 
That for you oft they quit their bright and great 

Metropolis above. 



THE PINE TREE. 



Old as Jove, 

Old as Love, 

Who of me 

Tells the pedigree? 

Only the mountains old, 

Only the waters cold. 

Only moon and star, 

My coevals are. 

•Ere the first fowl sung. 

My relenting l)oughs among, 

Ere Adam wived, 

Ere Adam lived, 

Ere the duck dived, 

Ere the bees hived. 

Ere the lion roared, 

Ere the eagle soared. 

Ijight and heat, land and sea, 

Spake unto the oldest tree. 

E M !■: H so N : " TT bod Notes. ' ' 



64 TKEES AND TREE-PLANTING. 



THE PINE TREE. 



The tremendous unity of the pine absorbs and moulds the life of 
a race. The pine shadows rest upon a nation. The northern peoples, 
century after century, lived under oue or other of the two great pow- 
ers of the pine and the sea, both iufinite. They dwelt amidst the 
forests as they wandered on the waves, and saw no eud nor auy other 
horizon. Still the dark, green trees, or the dark, green waters jagged 
the dawn with their friuge or their foam. And whatever elements of 
imagiuatiou, or of w'arrior strength, or of domestic justice were brought 
down by the Norwegian or the Goth against the dissoluteness or degra- 
dation of the south of Europe were taught them under the green roofe 
and wild penetralia of the pine. 

RusKiN : "Modern Painters." 



There is a pleasure in a pathless wood. 

Byron, 

There is a serene and settled majesty in woodland scenery that 
enters into the soul, and delights and elevates it, and fills it with 
noble inclinations. 

Washington Irving. 

As the leaves of trees are said to absorb all noxious qualities of the 
air, and to breathe forth a purer atmosphere, so it seems to me as if 
they drew from us all sordid and angry passions, and breathed 
forth peace and philanthropy. 

Washington Irving. 



There is something nobly simple and pure in a taste for the cul- 
tivation of forest trees. It ai'gues, I think, a sweet and generous nature 
to have this strong relish for the beauties of vegetation, and this 
friendship for the hardy and glorious sons of the forest. There is a 
grandeur of thought connected with this j^art of rural economy. It 
is, if I may be allowed the figure, the heroic line of husbandry. It 
is worthy of liberal, and free born, and aspiring men. He who plants 
an oak, looks forward to future ages, and plants for posterity. Noth- 
ing can be less selfish than this. 

Washington Irving. 






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